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OTHER   VOLUMES  IN  THIS  SERIES 
EDITED  BY  RUFUS  M.  JONES. 

STUDIES   IN  MYSTICAL  RELIGION  (190%.     By  RUFUS 
M.  JONES.  J 

BOEHME    AND    OTHER    MYSTICAL    INFLUENCES. 
By  RUFUS  M.  JONES.  [/«  Preparation. 

THE    BEGINNINGS    OF    QUAKERISM.      By   WILLIAM 
CHARLES  BRAITHWAITE.  [/«  Press. 

THE  PERIOD  OF  QUIETISM.     By  JOAN  M.  FRY. 

[/«  Preparation. 


THE   QUAKERS 
IN   THE   AMERICAN    COLONIES 


MACMILLAN  AND  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON  •  BOMBAY  •  CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK  •    BOSTON  •    CHICAGO 

ATLANTA  •   SAN   FRANCISCO 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TORONTO 


THE  QUAKERS 


IN    THE 


AMERICAN  COLONIES 


BY 

RUFUS   M.  JONES,  M.A.,  D.Lrrr. 

PROFESSOR   OF    PHILOSOPHY,    HAVERFORB  COLLEGE,    U.S.A. 


ASSISTED    BY 

ISAAC   SHARPLESS,   D.Sc. 

PRESIDENT   OF   HAVERFORD   COLLEGE 
AND 

AMELIA    M.   GUMMERE 

AUTHOR  OF    'THE  QUAKER— A  STUDY   IN   COSTUME* 


o>| 

*-, 


MACMILLAN    AND    CO.,   LIMITED 

ST.   MARTIN'S   STREET,   LONDON 

1911 


PREFACE 

THE  story  of  the  Quaker  invasion  of  the  Colonies  in  the 
New  World  has  often  been  told  in  fragmentary  fashion, 
but  no  adequate  study  of  the  entire  Quaker  movement 
in  colonial  times  has  yet  been  made  from  original  sources, 
free  from  partisan  or  sectarian  prejudice  and  in  historical 
perspective.  By  far  the  most  important  history  of 
American  Quakerism  covering  our  period  is  Bowden's 
History  of  Friends  in  America  (London,  vol.  i.  1850, 
vol.  ii.  1854),  but  it  is  plainly  written  from  the  Quaker 
point  of  view  and  does  not  furnish  a  critical  investigation 
of  Quakerism  and  its  work  in  the  New  World.  Thomas's 
History  of  the  Society  of  Friends  in  America  (written 
originally  for  the  American  Church  History  Series,  and 
published  separately  in  1895)  is  an  excellent  piece  of 
work,  done  in  an  impartial  and  historical  spirit,  though  too 
brief  to  allow  of  much  detail.  Weeks's  Southern  Quakers 
and  Slavery  (Baltimore,  1896)  is  scholarly  and  judicial, 
and  is  the  best  work  in  existence  for  the  section  covered. 
There  have  been  many  accounts  written  from  the 
anti-Quaker  point  of  view,  but  they  are  for  the  most 
part  one-sided  and  coloured  by  prejudice,  and  they  are 
obviously  lacking  in  penetration  into  the  inner  meaning 
of  the  type  of  religion  which  they  undertake  to  present. 
Bancroft  has  given  considerable  space  to  the  Quakers 
in  his  History  of  the  United  States.  His  account  is 
sympathetic,  but  it  is  largely  an  abstract  treatment  of  their 
religious  principles  rather  than  a  truly  historical  picture. 


vi        QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES 

This  volume  is  an  attempt  to  study  historically  and 
critically  the  religious  movement  inaugurated  in  the  New 
World  by  the  Quakers,  a  movement  important  both  for 
the  history  of  the  development  of  religion  and  for  the 
history  of  the  American  Colonies,  and  to  present  it  not 
only  in  its  external  setting  but  also  in  the  light  of  its 
inner  meaning.  It  has  been  written  as  a  contribution 
toward  the  completion  of  a  plan  to  write  a  full  history  of 
the  Quaker  movement  on  the  two  continents,  conceived 
by  my  beloved  friend,  John  Wilhelm  Rowntree,  and 
interrupted  by  his  death.  No  one  can  now  accomplish 
precisely  what  he  was  conceiving — 

Ah  !  who  shall  lift  the  wand  of  magic-power 
And  the  lost  clew  regain  ? 

But  a  group  of  his  friends  have  resolved  that,  as  far  as 
possible,  his  work  shall  go  forward,  and  we  hope  that 
eventually  the  projected  series  may  be  brought  to 
completion. 

I  have  been  assisted  in  the  present  volume  by  Isaac 
Sharpless,  who  has  written  the  section  on  Pennsylvania, 
and  by  Amelia  M.  Gummere,  who  has  written  the  section 
on  New  Jersey.  I  have  received  valuable  suggestions 
and  help  from  William  Charles  Braithwaite,  of  Banbury, 
England  ;  Norman  Penney,  of  London  ;  Augustine  Jones, 
of  Newton  Highlands,  Massachusetts ;  Professor  Allen 
C.  Thomas,  of  Haverford,  Pennsylvania  ;  and  John  Cox, 
jun.,  of  New  York  City.  I  have,  with  permission,  made 
use  of  the  map  in  Weeks's  Southern  Quakers  and  Slavery 
in  locating  some  of  the  places  on  my  map  of  the  southern 
colonies.  My  wife  has  read  the  proofs  and  prepared  the 
Index,  and  has  in  many  other  ways  assisted  in  my  work 
on  this  volume. 

HAVERFORD,  PENNSYLVANIA, 
March  191 1. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

INTRODUCTION  .  xiii 


BOOK    I 
THE  QUAKERS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND 

CHAPTER   I 
A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT 3 

CHAPTER    II 
THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  .....  26 


45 


CHAPTER   IV 
THE  MARTYRS  .        .  .      ......     -.        .        ...        .      63 

CHAPTER   V 
THE  KING'S  MISSIVE        .   .     ;        ...        .        .        .      90 


viii     QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES 

CHAPTER   VI 

LATER  EXPANSIONS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND 


CHAPTER   VII 
A  NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION.       ..        .         .        .136 

CHAPTER   VIII 

NEW  ENGLAND  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS      .         .         .        .171 


BOOK    II 
QUAKERISM  IN  THE  COLONY  OF  NEW  YORK 

CHAPTER   I 

THE  PLANTING  OF  QUAKERISM  IN  NEW  YORK         .         .215 

CHAPTER    II 
NEW  YORK  QUAKERISM — ITS  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES      242 

BOOK    III 
THE  QUAKERS  IN  THE  SOUTHERN  COLONIES 

CHAPTER   I 
THE  PLANTING  OF  QUAKERISM  IN  THE  SOUTHERN  COLONIES   265 


CONTENTS  ix 

CHAPTER   II 

PAGE 

THE  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  OF  SOUTHERN  FRIENDS     .     302 

CHAPTER    III 
SOUTHERN  QUAKERS  IN  PUBLIC  LIFE       .         .        .         -329 


CHAPTER    I 
THE  SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS 357 

CHAPTER    II 
MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE     .         .  .        .         .372 

CHAPTER    III 
JOHN  WOOLMAN  :  THE  NEGROES       .         .         .         .         .     391 

CHAPTER    IV 
JOHN  WOOLMAN  :  THE  INDIANS        .         .        .         .         .401 

BOOK    V 
THE  QUAKERS   IN  PENNSYLVANIA 

CHAPTER   I 

THE  SETTLEMENT     .        .        .^  .        .        .        .417 


x        QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


CHAPTER    II 

1  A..h 

WILLIAM  PENN  IN  PENNSYLVANIA    .         . '  .        .423 


CHAPTER   III 
EARLY  DAYS — THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY         .  .     437 

CHAPTER   IV 
GOVERNMENT     .  ;        .  .         .        .     459 

CHAPTER   V 
THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS  .        ...        .        .475 

CHAPTER    VI 
FRIENDS  AND  THE  INDIANS 495 

CHAPTER   VII 
FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY     . 509 

CHAPTER   VIII 
GENERAL  CONDITIONS,  1700-1775 522 

CHAPTER    IX 
THE  FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION  .        .        .        .        .556 

INDEX    .  .  -.        •      581 


MAPS 

(At  end  of  Volume) 

I.  MAP  OF  QUAKER  LOCALITIES  IN  EASTERN  NEW  YORK. 

II.  A    MAP    OF    QUAKER    LOCALITIES    IN    THE    SOUTHERN 
COLONIES. 

III.  A  MAP  OF  THE  PHILADELPHIA  YEARLY  MEETING,  1838. 

IV.  A  MAP  OF  THE  YEARLY  MEETING  OF  FRIENDS  FOR  NEW 

ENGLAND,  A.D.  1833. 


"THE  WORLD  OF  THE  WORLD" 

Be  of  good  cheer,  brave  spirit  ;  steadfastly 

Serve  that  low  whisper  thou  hast  served  ;  for  know, 

God  hath  a  select  family  of  sons 

Now  scattered  wide  thro'  earth  and  each  alone, 

Who  are  thy  spiritual  kindred,  and  each  one, 

By  constant  service  to  that  inward  law, 

Is  weaving  the  sublime  proportions 

Of  a  true  monarch's  soul.     Beauty  and  strength, 

The  riches  of  a  spotless  memory, 

The  eloquence  of  truth,  the  wisdom  got 

By  searching  of  a  clear  and  loving  eye 

That  seeth  as  God  seeth.     These  are  their  gifts, 

And  Time,  who  keeps  God's  word,  brings  on  the  day 

To  seal  the  marriage  of  these  minds  with  thine, 

Thine  everlasting  lovers.     Ye  shall  be 

The  salt  of  all  the  elements,  world  of  the  world. 

RALPH  WALDO  EMERSON. 


xii 


INTRODUCTION 

AMERICAN  Quakerism  is  closely  bound  up  in  origin  and 
history  with  the  wider  religious  movement  which  had  its 
rise  in  the  English  Commonwealth,  under  the  leadership 
of  George  Fox.1  This  type  of  religion,  which  took  root 
in  the  American  Colonies  in  1657,  and  which  grew  to  be 
a  significant  and  far-reaching  influence  in  at  least  ten 
Colonies,  had  already  for  ten  years  been  powerfully  stirring 
the  middle  classes,  and  had  rapidly  gathered  numbers  in 
the  English  counties.  When  the  volunteers  went  forth 
for  "  the  mighty  work  in  the  nations  beyond  the  seas,"  as 
they  expressed  their  mission,  they  were  the  representatives 
of  an  expanding  body  of  believers  at  home,  the  executives 
of  a  matured  policy  of  spiritual  conquest,  and  they  went 
forth  to  their  "  hardships  and  hazards  "  with  an  organised 
financial  support  behind  them.2  They  felt,  as  their  own 
testimony  plainly  shows,  that  they  were  not  solitary 
adventurers,  but  that  God  was  pushing  them  out  to  be 
the  bearers  of  a  new  and  mighty  word  of  Life  which  was 
to  remake  the  world,  and  that  the  whole  group  behind 

1  The  history  of  the  rise  of  Quakerism  has  been  written  for  this  series  by 
William  Charles  Braithwaite  in  the  volume  The  Beginnings  of  Quakerism. 

3  At  a  great  General  Meeting  held  at  Scalehouse,  near  Skipton,  in  England, 
in  1658,  an  Epistle  was  issued  which  called  for  funds  to  push  the  work  in  the 
Western  world.  The  following  extract  indicates  the  spirit  of  the  document : 
"  Having  heard  of  the  great  things  done  by  the  mighty  power  of  God  in  many 
nations  beyond  the  seas,  whither  He  hath  called  forth  many  of  our  dear  brethren 
and  sisters  to  preach  the  everlasting  gospel  .  .  .  our  bowels  yearn  for  them 
and  our  hearts  are  filled  with  tender  love  to  those  precious  ones  of  God  who  so 
freely  have  given  up  for  the  Seed's  sake  their  friends,  their  near  relations,  their 
country  and  worldly  estates,  yea  and  their  lives  also.  We,  therefore,  with  one 
consent  freely  and  liberally  offer  up  our  earthly  substance,  according  as  God 
hath  blessed  every  one — to  be  speedily  sent  up  to  London  as  a  freewill  offering 
for  the  Seed's  sake."  (The  MS.  of  this  Epistle  is  in  the  Library  at  Devonshire 
House,  London,  in  Portfolio,  16-1.) 


xiv     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES 

them  was  in  some  sense  embodied  in  them.  Throughout 
all  the  years  during  which  the  campaign  of  spiritual 
conquest  was  being  pushed  forward,  the  entire  Society  in 
England  was  pledged  to  the  task  of  carrying  its  "  truth  " 
into  the  life  of  the  New  World,  and  even  as  early  as  1 660 
George  Fox  was  planning  for  the  founding  of  a  Colony  in 
America,  where  Quakers  could  try  their  faith  and  work 
out  their  ideals  unmolested.1  A  study  of  Fox's  printed 
Epistles  will  convince  any  one  that  the  "  Seed  in  America  " 
was  always  prominent  in  his  thought  and  in  his  plans.2 
In  fact  no  other  religious  body  in  the  Old  World  more 
completely  identified  itself  with  the  fortunes  of  its  apostles 
in  the  New  World  than  did  the  Quakers,  then  in  the  youth 
and  vigour  of  their  career. 

Throughout  the  entire  period  covered  by  this  history 
— 1656  to  1780 — Quakerism  was  an  expanding  force  in 
the  Colonies,  and  there  were  times  within  this  period 
when  it  seemed  destined  to  become  one  of  the  foremost 
religious  factors  in  the  life  and  development  of  America. 
It  is  clearly  evident  from  their  own  writings  that  at  the 
opening  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  Quaker  leaders 
expected  to  make  their  type  of  religion  prevail  on  the 
Western  continent.  They  believed,  in  fact,  that  their 
"  Principle  "  was  universally  true  and  would  make  its  way 
through  the  race,  and  that  their  experiment  was  only  the 
beginning  of  a  world  -  religion  of  the  Spirit.  The  New 
World  seemed  to  them  a  providential  field  to  be  won  for 
their  truth.  It  was  in  the  New  World  alone  that  favour 
able  opportunities  offered  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth 
centuries  for  the  application  of  Quaker  ideals  to  public 
life,  and  the  opportunities  were  quickly  seized.  In  Great 
Britain  there  were  insuperable  bars  which  kept  Quakers 
out  of  public  service  to  the  state  and  forced  them  to 
adopt  a  life  apart  from  the  main  currents.  One  famous 
Quaker,  John  Archdale,  who  took  a  prominent  part  in 
the  making  of  three  American  Colonies — Maine,  North 
Carolina  and  South  Carolina — was  elected  to  the  English 

1  Letter  of  Josiah   Coale  to  George  Fox  from   Maryland,    January    1661. 
A.  R.  Barclay  CoL  of  MSS.  in  Devonshire  House,  No.  53. 

a  Fox's  Epistles  (first  ed.  1698  ;  American  ed.  1831,  2  vols. ). 


INTRODUCTION  xv 

Parliament  in  1698,  but  his  refusal  to  take  an  oath  cost 
him  his  seat,  and  ended  all  attempts  on  the  part  of 
Quakers  to  enter  the  field  of  politics.  In  America  the 
situation  was  quite  different.  In  the  Puritan  Colonies 
of  New  England,  Quakers  were,  of  course,  without  the 
privileges  of  franchise  or  office -holding,  and  in  Episco 
palian  Colonies  like  Virginia,  where  uniformity  was  insisted 
upon,  the  way  to  influence  in  the  government  was  tightly 
closed  to  them  ;  but  in  Rhode  Island  the  only  obstacle  to 
position  in  Government  affairs  which  the  Quakers  met 
was  the  difficulty  of  bearing  responsibility  for  war- 
preparation.  In  that  Colony  for  more  than  a  hundred 
years  Quakers  were  continually  in  office,  and  for  thirty- 
six  terms  the  Governorship  of  the  colony  was  occupied 
by  members  of  the  Society.  In  Pennsylvania  they  had 
one  of  the  largest  and  most  influential  Colonies  of  the 
New  World  in  their  own  hands.  They  came  into  possession 
of  West  Jersey  in  1674,  and  five  years  later  East  Jersey 
also  passed  into  their  hands,  so  that  they  had  the  govern 
mental  control  of  New  Jersey  until  it  became  a  royal 
Colony. 

Until  1701  they  were  the  only  organised  religious 
denomination  in  North  Carolina,  and  the  administration 
of  the  Quaker,  John  Archdale,  profoundly  shaped  the 
history  of  both  Carolinas.  Naturally  Quakers  in  the  Old 
World  looked  to  the  New  as  a  land  of  promise,  and  no 
pains  were  spared  to  spread  the  "  Seed  "  in  the  favourable 
regions  along  the  Atlantic  coast,  so  that  by  the  middle 
of  the  eighteenth  century  there  were  more  Quakers  in 
the  Western  hemisphere  than  in  Great  Britain.  They 
formed  half  the  population  of  Newport  in  1700  and 
for  many  years  after,  and  down  to  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century  they  were  a  majority  of  the  popula 
tion  of  the  South  Narragansett  shore  of  Rhode  Island, 
now  Washington  County.  There  were  at  this  period 
three  thousand  Quakers  in  the  southern  section  of 
Massachusetts,  once  the  territory  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers. 
About  one-third  of  the  inhabitants  in  the  Piscataqua 
region  of  Maine  and  New  Hampshire  were  Quakers. 


xvi     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

Lynn,  Salem,  Newbury,  and  Hampton  had  large  Meetings, 
and  many  of  the  inland  rural  districts  of  Massachusetts 
and  Rhode  Island  were  predominantly  Quaker.  They 
formed  a  large  proportion  of  the  Long  Island  towns 
and  the  towns  of  Westchester  County  on  the  mainland, 
and  by  the  middle  of  the  century  they  constituted  an 
influential  body  in  New  York  City.  There  were  not 
less  than  twenty-five  thousand  Quakers  in  Pennsylvania 
before  the  end  of  our  period,  and  probably  not  far  from 
six  thousand  in  New  Jersey.  There  were  by  official 
figures  three  thousand  in  Maryland,  probably  four  or 
five  thousand  in  Virginia,  and  about  the  same  number  in 
the  Carolinas.  They  were  thrifty,  prosperous,  and  quiet 
in  their  modes  of  life,  but  contributing  their  share  of  the 
hard  labour  which  turned  the  dense  forests  into  flourishing 
fields,  and  their  share  also  of  those  subtler  formative 
forces  which  prepared  the  way  in  the  wilderness  for  a 
great  national  life,  then  hardly  dreamed  of.  It  is  no 
doubt  a  home-spun  narrative,  but  history  is  no  longer 
aristocratic.  It  does  not  confine  its  purview  to  selected 
heroes  and  purple-tinted  events.  It  has  become  interested 
in  the  common  man  and  in  plain  every-day  happenings, 
and  this  story,  though  modest,  is  a  contribution  to  the 
real  life  of  America. 

The  extent  of  the  Quaker  influence  in  the  political 
life  of  the  Colonies  has  not  been  generally  realised.  The 
"  holy  experiment "  of  Penn  had  striking  and  dramatic 
features  which  have  always  impressed  the  imagination, 
but  the  quieter  work  of  New  England  and  Carolina 
Quakers  has  received  much  less  notice  and  has  waited 
long  for  a  historian.  But  while  emphasising  this  neglected 
field  of  Quaker  activity,  we  must  not  lose  our  perspective 
and  balance.  The  Quakers'  supreme  passion  was  the 
cultivation  of  inward  religion  and  an  outward  life  con 
sistent  with  the  vision  of  their  souls.  "  Experiments  in 
government "  whether  successful  or  unsuccessful,  whether 
wise  or  unwise,  were  never  their  primary  aim.  Beneath 
these  ventures,  there  always  existed  a  deeper  purpose — 
to  make  a  fresh  experiment  in  spiritual  religion — as  the 


INTRODUCTION  xvii 

living  pulse  of  all  Quaker  aspiration,  and  by  this  central 
aim  the  movement  must  be  finally  estimated  and  judged. 
These  American  Quakers  of  the  period  here  studied 
believed,  with  a  white-hot  intensity,  that  they  had  dis 
covered,  or  rediscovered,  a  new  spiritual  Principle  which 
they  thought  was  destined  to  revolutionise  life,  society, 
civil  government,  and  religion.  The  Principle  (and  they 
always  spelled  it  with  a  capital  P)  which  they  claimed  to 
have  discovered  was  the  presence  of  a  Divine  Light  in 
man,  a  radiance  from  the  central  Light  of  the  spiritual 
universe,  penetrating  the  deeps  of  every  soul,  which  if 
responded  to,  obeyed,  and  accepted  as  a  guiding  star, 
would  lead  into  all  truth  and  into  all  kinds  of  truth. 
They  thought  that  they  had  found  a  way  to  the  direct 
discovery  of  the  Will  of  God  and  that  they  could  thereby 
put  the  Kingdom  of  God  into  actual  operation  here  in 
the  world.  The  whole  momentous  issue  of  life,  they 
insisted,  is  settled  by  personal  obedience  or  disobedience 
to  the  inward  Divine  revelation.  The  wisdom  of  the 
infinite  God  is  within  reach  of  the  feeblest  human  spirit ; 
the  will  of  the  Eternal  is  voiced  in  the  soul  of  every 
man  ;  it  is  life  to  hear  and  obey ;  it  is  death  to  follow 
other  voices.  This  underlying  conception  forms  the 
spring  and  motive  of  all  the  distinctive  activities  of  the 
colonial  Quakers.  They  risked  everything  they  had  on 
the  truth  of  this  Principle,  and  they  must  be  judged  by 
the  way  in  which  they  worked  out  their  experiment  in 
religion.  They  were  champions  of  causes  which  seemed 
new  and  dangerous  to  those  who  heard  them,  but  behind 
all  their  propaganda  there  was  one  live  central  faith 
from  which  everything  radiated — the  faith  that  God 
speaks  directly  to  the  human  spirit,  and  that  religion, 
to  be  true  and  genuine,  must  be  a  reality  of  first-hand 
experience. 

There  have  been  many  individuals  in  the  Christian 
Church  who  have  been  exponents  of  this  mystical  idea 
that  God  manifests  Himself  inwardly  to  the  soul  of  man 
and  that  His  real  presence  can  be  directly,  immediately, 
experienced.  The  testimony  of  such  mystics  has  pro- 


xviii  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

foundly  interested  our  generation  and  their  experiences 
have  received  searching  psychological  examination  at  the 
hands  of  experts.1  The  novel  and  interesting  thing  about 
this  Quaker  experiment  is  that  it  furnishes  an  opportunity 
to  study  inward  mystical  religion  embodied  in  a  group 
and  worked  out  through  a  long  span  of  historical  develop 
ment.  We  shall  here  see  the  intense  personal  faith  of  one 
or  a  few  fusing  an  entire  group  and  creating  an  atmo 
sphere,  a  climate,  into  which  children  were  born  and 
through  which  they  formed  their  lives  ;  we  shall  be  able 
to  study  the  effect  of  the  cooling  processes  of  time  on 
this  faith  so  intense  at  its  origin  ;  we  shall  discover  how 
this  startlingly  bold  Principle  met  the  slow  siftings  and 
testings  of  history  ;  and  we  shall  find  out  how  any  merely 
inward  and  mystical  facts  must  be  supplemented  and 
corrected  by  the  wider  concrete  and  objective  experience 
of  the  race. 

It  is  true,  no  doubt,  that  religion  is  in  the  last 
analysis  a  personal  matter,  but  it  is  also  true  that  nobody 
cut  apart  from  social  interests  and  isolated  from  the 
purposes  and  strivings  of  a  group  of  fellows  could  become 
a  person  at  all,  or  could  exhibit  what  we  mean  by  religion. 
And,  therefore,  while  we  go  to  biography  for  our  most 
definite  accounts  of  religious  experience,  it  is  through  the 
unfolding  of  history  that  we  can  trace  out  the  full  signi 
ficance  of  a  first-hand  faith  like  the  one  here  in  question, 
and  only  in  the  vast  laboratory  of  history,  where  every 
hypothesis  must  submit  to  a  stern  test,  can  it  be  fairly 
verified  or  transcended.  The  following  chapters  as  they 
unfold  will  present  the  Quaker  Principle  in  sufficient 
detail,  will  exhibit  it  in  sharp  collision  with  other  views, 
and  will  show  its  points  of  strength  and  weakness  ;  but  a 
few  clues  indicated  here  in  the  Introduction  will  perhaps 
help  the  reader  to  find  his  way  more  easily  and  more 
intelligently. 

1  James,  Varieties  of  Religious  Experience  ;  Coe,  Spiritual  Life ;  Granger, 
The  Soul  of  a  Christian;  Pratt,  The  Psychology  of  Religious  Belief;  Ames, 
The  Psychology  of  Religious  Experience ;  Delacroix,  Les  Grands  Mystiques. 
Chretiens  ;  Inge,  Christian  Mysticism  ;  Von  Hiigel,  The  Mystical  Element  in 
Religion  ;  Evelyn  Underbill,  Mysticism  ;  Jones,  Studies  in  Mystical  Religion. 


INTRODUCTION  xix 

i.  One  point  which  this  volume  will  clearly  settle  is 
the  fact  that  there  existed  in  the  Colonies,  before  the 
arrival  of  the  Quaker  missionaries,  a  large  number  of 
persons,  in  some  instances  more  or  less  defined  groups  of 
persons,  who  were  seeking  after  a  freer  and  more  inward 
type  of  religion  than  that  which  prevailed  in  any  of  the 
established  Churches. 

The  period  of  the  English  Commonwealth  witnessed 
an  extraordinary  revival  of  faith  in  man's  power  to  dis 
cover  the  inward  way  to  God,  and  mystical  sects,  some 
of  them  wise  and  sane,  some  of  them  foolish  and  fanatical, 
swarmed  almost  faster  than  they  could  be  named.  These 
mystical  sectaries  had  one  idea  in  common  :  they  believed 
that  God  was  in  man  and  that  revelation  was  not  closed. 
They  were  waiting  for  the  dawn  of  a  fresh  Light  from 
heaven.1  Wherever  English  Colonists  of  this  period 
went  these  sectaries  went  too.  They  were  a  constant 
annoyance  to  New  England  Puritans,  to  Dutch  Calvinists, 
and  to  Virginia  Churchmen.  They  generally  gathered 
kindred  spirits  around  them  and  quietly — or  sometimes 
noisily — propagated  their  mystical  faith.  They  exalted 
personal  experience,  direct  intercourse  with  God,  and  so 
put  much  less  stress  than  their  neighbours  did  upon  the 
forms  and  doctrines  which  had  come  to  be  regarded 
as  essential  elements  of  a  sound  and  stable  faith.  This 
was  the  prepared  soil  in  which  Quakerism  spread  at  its 
first  appearing,  and  without  which  the  efforts  of  the 
propagators,  however  valiant,  would  almost  certainly 
have  been  futile.  The  Quaker  missionaries  simply 
gave  positive  direction  to  tendencies  already  powerfully 
underway.  They  brought  to  clear  focus  ideas  which 
were  before  vague  and  indefinite,  and  they  fused  into 
white  heat  spirits  that  were  feeling  after  and  dimly 
seeking  what  they  now  heard  in  their  own  tongue. 
The  first  "  Quaker  Churches  "  in  America  were  formed 
out  of  this  sort  of  material ;  and  so  too  were  many  of 
the  Meetings  which  came  into  being  at  later  periods  of 
expansion. 

1  See  chapters  xiv.  -xx.  of  my  Studies  in  Mystical  Religion. 


xx      QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES 

2.  One  of  the  first  tasks  which  confronts  the  historian 
who  proposes  to  deal  with  the  religious  life  of  the 
Colonies — especially  of  the  New  England  Colonies — is 
to  understand  and  fairly  estimate  the  collision  between 
the  Puritans  and  the  Quakers.  In  many  respects  they 
were  both  the  product  of  a  common  movement,  the 
spiritual  offspring  of  the  same  epoch.  They  both 
possessed  a  passion  for  righteousness — a  moral  earnestness 
— that  hardly  has  a  historical  parallel  except  in  the 
great  Hebrew  prophets.  They  both  took  a  very  pro 
nounced  stand  against  "  natural  pleasures,"  enjoyments  of 
"  the  world "  and  of  "  the  flesh,"  in  fact  against  actions 
of  any  kind  along  the  line  of  least  resistance.  They  were 
both  opposed  to  fashions  and  customs  which  fostered,  in 
any  way,  looseness  of  life,  or  which  ministered,  in  any 
degree,  to  personal  pride  and  selfishness.  In  short,  they 
were  both  "  puritan,"  in  the  ancient  sense  of  the  word,  in 
their  moral  basis  and  in  their  conception  of  social 
proprieties.  They  both  hated  tyranny  with  an  intense 
hatred,  though  they  took  very  different  ways  of  destroying 
it ;  and  they  both  abhorred  sacerdotalism  in  religion, 
though  they  drew  the  line  where  sacerdotalism  began  at 
very  different  points. 

But  if  they  were  allied  in  spirit  in  some  common 
elemental  aspects  ;  they  were  nevertheless  exponents  of 
very  antagonistic  types  of  religion  which,  seen  from  the 
different  angles  of  vision  and  perspective,  were  absolutely 
irreconcilable,  and  it  was  still  the  fashion  then  to  count 
it  sin  to  be  weak  in  infallibility.  Our  generation  is  so 
open-minded  and  hospitable ;  so  weaned  of  the  taste  of 
finality-doctrines,  that  we  look  almost  with  amazement  at 
these  exponents  of  the  fiery  positive  ;  these  tournaments 
to  settle  which  "  infallible  truth "  really  was  infallible. 
We  must,  however,  always  bear  in  mind  that  religious 
indifference  is  a  distinctly  modern  trait.  The  testimony 
of  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ward  of  Ipswich,  Massachusetts,  in 
1645,  might  be  paralleled  in  almost  any  ecclesiastical 
writing  of  that  period :  "  It  is  said  that  men  ought  to 
have  liberty  of  conscience  and  that  it  is  persecution  to 


INTRODUCTION  xxi 

debar  them  of  it.  I  can  rather  stand  amazed  than  reply 
to  this.  It  is  an  astonishment  that  the  brains  of  a  man 
should  be  parboiled  in  such  impious  ignorance."  John 
Callender,  writing  of  the  freedom  established  in  the  little 
Colony  on  the  island  of  Rhode  Island  says  with  much 
truth :  "  In  reality  the  true  Grounds  of  Liberty  of 
Conscience  were  not  then  [1637]  known,  or  embraced 
by  any  Sect  or  Party  of  Christians  ;  all  parties  seemed 
to  think  that  as  they  only  were  in  possession  of  the 
Truth,  so  they  alone  had  a  right  to  restrain  and  crush 
all  other  opinions,  which  they  respectively  called  Error 
and  Heresy,  where  they  were  the  most  numerous  and 
powerful."  * 

Here  in  the  same  field  were  two  exponents  of  the 
"  fiery  positive,"  both  profoundly,  sincerely  conscious  of 
the  infallible  truth  of  their  convictions,  and  with  their 
lives  staked  upon  divergent  and  irreconcilable  conceptions 
of  Divine  revelation.  For  the  Puritan,  revelation  was  a 
miraculous  projection  of  God's  Word  and  Will  from  the 
supernatural  world  into  this  world.  This  "  miraculous 
projection  "  had  been  made  only  in  a  distinct  "  dispensa 
tion,"  through  a  limited  number  of  Divinely  chosen, 
specially  prepared  "  instruments,"  who  received  and 
transmitted  the  pure  Word  of  God.  When  the  "dis 
pensation  "  ended,  revelation  came  to  a  definite  close. 
No  word  more  could  be  added,  as  also  none  could  be 
subtracted.  All  spiritual  truth  for  the  race  for  all  ages 
was  now  unveiled  ;  the  only  legitimate  function  which 
the  man  of  God  could  henceforth  exercise  was  that  of 
interpretation.  He  could  declare  what  the  Word  of  God 
meant  and  how  it  was  to  be  applied  to  the  complicated 
affairs  of  human  society.  Only  a  specialist  in  theology 
could,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  be  a  minister  under 
this  system.  The  minister  thus  became  invested  with  an 
extraordinary  dignity  and  possessed  of  an  influence  quite 
sui  generis. 

For  the  Quaker,  revelation  was  confined  to  no  "  dis 
pensation  " — it  had  never  been  closed.  If  any  period 

1  John  Callender's  Historical  Discourse  (Boston,  1739). 


xxii    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

was  peculiarly  "  the  dispensation  of  the  Holy  Spirit,"  the 
Quaker  believed  that  it  was  the  present  in  which  he  was 
living.  Instead  of  limiting  the  revelation  of  the  Word 
of  God  to  a  few  miraculous  "  instruments,"  who  had 
lived  in  a  remote  "  dispensation,"  he  insisted  that  God 
enlightens  every  soul  that  comes  into  the  world,  communes 
by  His  Holy  Spirit  with  all  men  everywhere,  illuminates 
the  conscience  with  a  clear  sense  of  the  right  and  the 
wrong  course  in  moral  issues,  and  reveals  His  Will  in 
definite  and  concrete  matters  to  those  who  are  sensitive 
recipients  of  it.  The  true  minister,  for  the  Quaker  of 
that  period,  was  a  prophet  who  spoke  under  a  moving 
and  by  a  power  beyond  his  human  powers,  and  so  was, 
in  fresh  and  living  ways,  a  revealer  of  present  truth, 
and  not  a  mere  interpreter  of  a  past  revelation.  The 
Quaker  "  meeting  "  was,  in  theory  at  least,  a  continuation 
of  Pentecost — an  occasion  for  the  free  blowing  of  the 
Spirit  of  God  on  men.  It  was  plainly  impossible  in  the 
seventeenth  century  for  those  two  types  of  Christianity 
to  live  peaceably  side  by  side.  A  tragic  collision  was 
inevitable. 

3.  There  is  another  problem  in  Quaker  history  no 
less  urgent  than  the  problem  of  collision  with  divergent 
conceptions  of  truth,  and  that  is  the  strange  fact  that  a 
movement  so  full  of  vitality  and  power  at  its  origin 
ceased  to  expand  with  the  expanding  life  of  America. 
So  long  as  the  "  tragic  collisions "  lasted,  the  Quakers 
flourished  and  seemed  sure  of  a  significant  future  in  the 
unfolding  spiritual  life  of  America  ;  as  soon  as  they  were 
free  and  unopposed  there  occurred  a  slowing-down  and  a 
loss  of  dynamic  impact  on  the  world.  No  treatment 
of  colonial  Quakerism  can  be  adequate  which  fails  to 
face  this  somewhat  depressing  fact,  for  the  historian  who 
presents  the  assets  and  achievements  of  a  movement  is 
under  obligation  to  deal  squarely  as  well  with  its  liabilities, 
weaknesses,  and  failures. 

The  thing  which  above  everything  else  doomed  the 
movement  to  a  limited  and  subordinate  r61e  was  the 
early  adoption  of  the  ideal  that  Quakers  were  to  form 


INTRODUCTION  xxiii 

a  "peculiar  people."  In  the  creative  stage  of  the 
movement  the  leaders  were  profoundly  conscious  that 
they  had  discovered  a  universal  truth  which  was  to 
permeate  humanity,  and  form,  by  its  inherent  demonstra 
tion  and  power,  a  World-Church — the  Church  of  the 
living  God.  It  was  in  that  faith  and  in  the  inspiration 
of  that  great  idea  that  the  pioneer  missionaries  went 
forth.  Then  gradually,  at  first  unconsciously,  in  the  face 
of  a  very  stubborn  world  that  not  only  was  not  persuaded, 
but  further  went  positively  to  work  to  suppress  the 
alleged  "fresh  revelation,"  the  movement  underwent  a 
radical  change  of  ideal.  The  aim  slowly  narrowed  down 
to  the  formation  of  a  "  spiritual  remnant,"  set  apart  to 
guard  and  preserve  "  the  truth  "  in  the  midst  of  a  crooked 
and  perverse  generation  that  would  not  see  and  believe. 
The  world-vision  faded  out,  and  the  attention  focused  on 
"  Quakerism "  as  an  end-in-itself.  The  transformation 
which  occurred  in  this  case  has  many  striking  parallels 
in  the  history  of  other  spiritual  experiments.  The 
living  idea  organises  a  definite  Society  for  the  propaga 
tion  of  it,  and  lo,  the  Society  unconsciously  smothers 
the  original  idea  and  becomes  absorbed  in  itself!  It 
is  a  very  ancient  tragedy,  and  that  tragedy  happened 
again  here  in  this  movement.  The  transformation  is 
written  large  on  the  Records  of  the  meetings  and  in 
the  Journals  of  the  leaders.  "  Truth  "  soon  came  to  be 
a  definite,  static  thing.  No  creed  was  made  and  no 
declaration  of  faith  was  adopted,  but  a  well-defined  body 
of  Quaker  conceptions  soon  came  into  shape,  and  came 
also  into  habitual  use.  Not  only  did  the  ideas  of  the 
Society  crystallise  into  static  concepts  of  truth,  the  form 
of  worship  too  became  fixed  and  well-nigh  unalterable. 
There  was  no  "  programme "  of  service  and  no  positive 
prearrangement,  but  it  was  soon  settled  that  silence  was 
the  essential  "  form  "  for  true  worship,  and  that  spiritual 
ministry  must  be  spontaneous,  unpremeditated,  and  of 
the  "  prophetic  "  type. 

The    primitive   aim   at   simplicity   and   the   desire   to 
escape  from  slavery  to  fashion  underwent  a  corresponding 


xxiv  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

change  and  dropped  to  the  easy  substitute  of  a  fixed 
form  of  dress  and  speech,  which  soon  became  itself  a 
kind  of  slavery.  A  definite  attitude  toward  music  and 
art  and  "  diversions "  in  general  was  adopted  so  that 
individuals  might  be  relieved  of  the  difficulty,  and 
incidentally  of  the  danger,  of  personal  decision.  Marriage 
with  "  the  world's  people "  was  made  as  difficult  as  it 
possibly  could  be  made.  In  short,  a  Quaker  became  a 
well-marked  and  definitely-labelled  individual — quite  as 
rigidly  set  as  any  of  the  "  religious  orders "  of  Church 
history  and  quite  as  bent  on  preserving  the  peculiar 
type.  Men  spent  their  precious  lives,  not  in  propagating 
the  living  principles  of  spiritual  religion  in  the  great 
life  of  the  world,  but  in  perfecting  and  transmitting  a 
"  system  "  within  the  circle  of  the  Society,  and  the  heart 
burnings  and  tragedies  which  mark  the  lives  of  the 
consecrated  men  and  women  who,  in  these  days,  bore 
the  ark,  were  too  often  concerned  with  the  secondary 
rather  than  with  the  primary  things  of  spiritual  warfare. 
The  martyrdoms  for  the  world-cause  were  heroic,  dramatic, 
and  of  universal  interest ;  these  later  travails  and  tragedies 
often  seem  petty,  trivial,  and  unnecessary,  and  they  make 
a  very  limited  appeal  to  human  interest. 

The  movement  was  hampered  from  the  start,  and  in 
every  stage  of  its  history  during  the  period  of  this  volume 
by  the  imperfect  conception  of  the  inward  Light,  and  of 
the  whole  relation  between  the  Divine  and  the  human, 
which  was  consciously  or  unconsciously  adopted.  This 
was  perhaps  inevitable,  as  every  movement  is  necessarily 
more  or  less  bound  up  with  the  prevailing  ideas,  the 
intellectual  climate,  of  the  age  in  which  it  takes  its 
rise.  In  the  seventeenth  and  early  eighteenth  centuries 
a  dualistic  universe  was  taken  for  granted.  There  was  a 
sharp  distinction,  a  wide  chasm,  between  the  "  natural " 
and  the  "  supernatural."  The  urgent  question  with  every 
body  was — not  how  the  entire  universe  from  material  husk 
to  spiritual  core  could  be  unified  and  comprehended  as  an 
organic  whole,  but  how  the  chasm  which  sundered  the 
two  worlds  could  be  miraculously  bridged.  It  is  not  our 


INTRODUCTION  xxv 

problem  to-day,  but  it  was  the  one  the  Quaker  was  facing. 
His  opponents  said  that  the  chasm  was  bridged  by  a 
miraculous  communication  of  the  Word  of  God  in  a 
definite  and  finished  Revelation.  He  said  that  it  was 
bridged  by  the  communication  of  a  supernatural  Light 
given  to  each  soul.  The  trouble  was  that  he  never  could 
succeed  in  bringing  into  unity  the  two  things  assumed  to 
be  sundered.  On  the  one  hand  there  was  the  "  mere 
man,"  whom  he  assumed,  as  everybody  else  did,  to  be,  in 
his  natural  condition,  non-spiritual  and  incapable  of  doing 
anything  toward  his  own  salvation ;  and  on  the  other  a 
Divine  Light,  or  Seed  of  God,  projected  into  this  "  natural 
man  "  as  the  illuminating,  saving,  and  revealing  Principle 
in  him.  The  Light  was  distinctly  conceived  as  something 
supernatural  and  foreign  to  man  as  man — something 
added  to  him  as  a  gift. 

With  this  basal  conception  for  his  working  theory,  the 
Quaker  naturally  and  logically  looked  upon  the  true 
minister  as  a  passive  and  oracular  "instrument"  of  the 
Holy  Spirit.  His  message,  in  so  far  as  it  was  "  spiritual," 
was  believed  to  come  "  through  him  and  from  beyond 
him."  He  was  not  a  teacher  or  an  interpreter,  he  was  a 
"  revealer "  through  whom  Divine  truth  was  "  opened." 
The  direct  result  of  such  a  view,  of  course,  was  that  human 
powers  were  lightly  esteemed  and  quite  distrusted.  Instead 
of  having  a  principle  which  brought  the  finite  being,  with 
all  his  potential  powers,  into  organic  union  with  the  self- 
revealing,  co-operating  God,  thus  producing  a  spiritual, 
developing,  autonomous  personality,  with  an  incentive  to 
expand  all  its  capacities ;  he  had  a  fundamental  con 
ception  which  tended  toward  a  distrust  and  suppression 
of  the  native  powers.  Spiritual  messages,  instead  of 
being  thought  of  as  the  contribution  which  a  person 
himself  makes  when  he  is  raised  to  his  highest  and 
best  by  co-operation  with  the  Divine  Spirit  in  whom  his 
finite  life  is  rooted,  were  thought  of  as  messages  oracu 
larly  "  given  "  to  him — his  part  being  simply  that  of  a 
transmitter. 

The  human  element  in  man's  spiritual  activities  was 


xxvi  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

discounted  and  almost  eliminated  in  order  to  heighten  the 
Divine  aspect,  as  in  an  earlier  theology  the  human  element 
in  Christ  had  been  suppressed  to  exalt  His  divinity. 
That  this  unpsychological  theory  worked  out  badly  in 
practice  there  can  be  no  question  in  the  mind  of  anybody 
who  studies  the  movement  historically ;  but  it  only  means 
that  they  were  unsuccessful  and  unhappy  in  their  way  of 
formulating  their  theory  of  Divine  and  human  intercourse. 
What  they  wanted  to  say  was  that  God  and  men  were  in 
direct  correspondence,  and  that  man  at  his  best  could  lay 
hold  of  life  and  light  and  wisdom  and  truth  which  ordin 
arily  transcends  his  narrow  finite  self.  Of  such  heightened 
correspondence  there  is  plenty  of  evidence.  The  only 
pity  is  that  their  wrongly -formulated  theory  so  often 
stood  in  their  way  and  hampered  them  and  prevented 
them  from  a  normal  use  of  all  their  capacities. 

Their  failure  to  appreciate  the  importance  of  the  fullest 
expansion  of  human  personality  by  education  is  the 
primary  cause  of  their  larger  failure  to  win  the  command 
ing  place  in  American  civilisation  of  which  their  early 
history  gave  promise.  Their  central  Principle,  properly 
understood,  called  for  a  fearless  education,  for  there  is  no 
safety  in  individualism,  in  personal  responsibility,  or  in 
democracy,  whether  in  civil  or  religious  matters,  unless 
every  individual  is  given  a  chance  to  correct  his  narrow 
individualism  in  the  light  of  the  experience  of  larger 
groups  of  men.  If  a  man  is  to  be  called  upon  to  follow 
"  his  Light,"  he  must  be  helped  to  correct  his  subjective 
seemings  by  the  gathered  objective  wisdom  of  the  race,  as 
expressed  in  scientific  truth,  in  historical  knowledge,  in 
established  institutions,  and  in  the  sifted  literature  of  the 
world.  The  Quaker  ideal  of  ministry,  too,  calls  for  a 
broad  and  expansive  education  even  more  than  does  that 
of  any  other  religious  body.  If  the  particular  sermon  is 
not  to  be  definitely  prepared,  then  the  person  who  is  to 
minister  must  himself  be  prepared.  If  he  is  to  avoid  the 
repetition  of  his  own  petty  notions  and  commonplace 
thoughts  he  must  form  a  richer  and  more  comprehensive 
experience  from  which  to  draw, 


INTRODUCTION  xxvii 

For  every  fiery  prophet  in  old  times, 

And  all  the  sacred  madness  of  the  bard, 

When  God  made  music  thro'  him,  could  but  speak 

His  music  by  the  framework  and  the  chord.1 

George  Fox  had  moments  of  insight  into  the  import 
ance  of  this  objective  element,  and  in  a  great  sentence  he 
urged  the  founding  of  educational  institutions  for  teaching 
"  everything  civil  and  useful  in  creation  "  ;  but  institutions 
of  such  scope  unfortunately  did  not  get  founded.  If  there 
could  have  been  established,  in  the  northern,  central,  and 
southern  sections  of  the  Atlantic  coast  line,  institutions 
adapted  to  the  right  education  of  Quaker  youth,  as  Har 
vard  and  Yale  were  to  the  education  of  the  Puritan  youth, 
there  would  be  quite  another  story  to  tell.  As  the  problem 
was  worked  out,  no  adequate  education  for  Quaker  youth 
was  available.  They  soon  found  themselves  largely  cut 
off  from  the  great  currents  of  culture,  and  they  thus  missed 
the  personal  enlargement  which  comes  when  one  is  forced 
to  make  his  own  ideals  fit  into  larger  systems  of  thought, 
and  is  compelled  to  reshape  them  in  the  light  of  facts. 
The  absence  of  constructive  leaders,  the  later  tendency  to 
withdraw  from  civic  tasks,  the  relaxing  of  the  idea  of 
reshaping  the  world,  which  this  history  reveals,  were  due, 
in  the  main,  to  the  lack  of  expansive  education.  The 
beautiful  old-fashioned  home  passed  on  to  the  child  who 
came  into  it  the  stock  of  truth  and  the  definite  ideals  which 
were  alive  in  it ;  it  fed  the  growing  mind  with  the  litera 
ture  which  its  people  had  produced,  and  the  Meetings 
furnished  a  spiritual  climate  that  was  sweet  and  whole 
some  to  breathe,  but  there  was  nothing  to  lift  the  youth 
up  to  a  sight  of  new  horizons.  He  was  more  or  less 
doomed  to  the  level  of  the  past.  The  denominations  that 
were  training  the  fittest  of  their  sons  to  become  thinkers 
and  leaders  were  sure  sooner  or  later  to  win  the  birthright 
and  to  take  away  the  blessing  from  the  Quakers. 

With  the  Revolutionary  War  there  came  a  great 
awakening,  which  showed  itself  most  definitely  in  a 
determination  to  provide  larger  opportunities  for  Quaker 

1  Tennyson's  "  Holy  Grail." 


xxviii  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

education.  Steps  were  taken  in  each  section  of  the 
country  to  provide  for  the  education  of  the  new  genera 
tion.  It  was  a  fortunate  awakening  and  it  has  led  to  great 
results,  but  it  came  too  late  to  enable  the  Quakers  to 
achieve  the  place  in  the  civilisation  of  the  Western  world 
which  their  early  history  prognosticated.  They  were 
already  being  left  behind,  and  were  already  accepting 
the  view  that  they  were  to  be  a  small  and  isolated 
sect — "  a  remnant "  of  God's  people.  The  fateful  years 
which  were  selecting  the  dominating  religious  forces  of 
America  were  the  years  of  colonial  development,  and 
during  those  eventful  years  the  Quakers  were  not  awake 
to  the  chance  that  was  going  by.  Then,  too,  when  the 
awakening  did  come,  there  was  still  a  long  period  during 
which  contracted  ideals  of  education  prevailed.  Nobody 
seemed  able  to  get  beyond  the  narrow  plan  of  "  guarded 
education,"  which  is  not,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word, 
education  at  all.  It  is  still  only  the  transmission  of 
certain  well-defined  and  "  safe "  ideas  and  tends  to  pro 
duce  uncreative  and  unconstructive  minds.  It  is  a  well- 
meant  plan  for  the  propagation  of  an  existing  body  of 
ideas,  but  it  does  not  and  cannot  make  large  and  force 
ful  leaders  and  creators  of  fresh  ideals.1  The  whole 
trend  of  the  century  before  had  been  toward  the  pre 
servation  of  a  definite  type  and  had  fostered  the  timid 
attitude.  It  was  not  to  be  expected,  when  the  awakening 
came,  that  there  would  be  men  ready  for  the  bold  ex 
periment  of  a  broad  and  fearless  education  which  set 
the  youth  free,  with  open  mind,  to  study  "  everything 
civil  iand  useful  in  creation,"  and  which  left  him  to  make 
his  own  selection  of  what  was  to  be  truth  for  him.  The 
Quaker  has  slowly  found  the  road  to  that  genuine  type 
of  education,  but  he  has  come  to  it  late.  Whether  he 
now  has  recovering  power  enough  to  repair  the  damages 
of  the  past  and  can  still  realise  the  destiny  which  seemed 
his  in  the  last  half  of  the  seventeenth  century,  is  not 
a  question  to  be  answered  here,  but  it  is  a  fact  that  his 

1  "Guarded"  is  often  used  in  another  sense,  namely,  that  young  and  tender 
children,  while  being  educated,  are  to  be  shielded  from  immoral  influences,  which 
is,  of  course,  highly  commendable. 


INTRODUCTION  xxix 

failure  to  provide  for  an  adequate  education  during  the 
formative  years  lies  at  the  base  of  his  larger  failure  to 
arrived 

4.  In  one  particular  respect  the  colonial  Quakers 
made  a  very  important  contribution  to  religion — they 
produced  saints,  and  these  saints  were  and  remain  Ihe 
finest  and  most  fragrant  bloom  of  American  Quakerism. 

Sainte-Beuve  has  given,  in  his  Port  Royal,  a  penetrat 
ing  account  of  persons  who  have  been  transformed  into 
saintly  life  through  the  reception  of  Divine  grace.  "  Such 
souls,"  he  says,  "  arrive  at  a  certain  fixed  and  invincible 
state,  a  state  which  is  genuinely  heroic,  and  from  out 
of  which  the  greatest  deeds  are  performed.  .  .  .  They 
have  an  inner  state  which  before  all  things  is  one  of 
love  and  humility,  of  infinite  confidence  in  God,  and  of 
severity  to  themselves,  accompanied  with  tenderness  for 
others."  This  is  an  accurate  account  of  the  colonial 
Quaker  saint — invincibly  fixed  in  purpose,  genuinely 
heroic,  ready  for  great  deeds,  possessed  of  infinite  con 
fidence  in  God,  and  withal  tender  in  love  and  humility. 
I  am  not  sure  that  our  busy  and  commercial  age  would 
call  these  saints  "  efficient " — they  were  not  trained  and 
equipped  as  modern  social  workers  are — but  they  were 
triumphantly  beautiful  spirits,  and  the  world  still  needs 
beautiful  lives  as  much  as  it  needs  "  efficient "  ones,  and 
the  beautiful  life  in  the  long  run  is  dynamic  and  does 
inherit  the  earth.2 

These  rare  and  beautiful  souls,  like  great  artistic 
creations  of  beauty,  are  not  capable  of  explanation  in 
utilitarian  terms,  nor  can  their  origin  be  traced  in  terms 
of  cause  and  effect,  but  it  can  safely  be  said  that  they 
never  come  except  among  people  consecrated  to  the 
Invisible  Church.  It  requires  a  pure  and  fervid  devotion 
to  the  Pattern  in  the  mount,  a  loyalty  to  the  holy 
Jerusalem — the  Urbs  Sion  mystica — to  fashion  a  Christian 

1  It  must  not  be  concluded  because  Quakerism  did  not  flourish  under  these 
conditions  and  limitations  that  therefore  its  spiritual  ideal  has  broken  down.     On 
the  contrary,  it  has  hardly  yet  been  given  an  adequate  trial. 

2  John  Woolman  is  the  consummate  flower  of  the  type  I  have  in  mind.      It 
was  a  saying  of  his  that  ' '  some  glances  of  real  beauty  may  be  seen  in  their  faces 
who  dwell  in  true  meekness." 


xxx    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

saint,  whether  Catholic  or  Quaker.  No  one  can  be 
wholly  absorbed  in  the  affairs  of  an  actual  earthly  church 
without  being  marred  by  the  politics  of  it,  and  without 
becoming  small  and  narrow  and  provincial  by  reason  of 
the  limitations  of  locality  and  temporal  climate.  The 
saint  belongs  to  an  actual  church,  to  be  sure,  loves  it 
and  serves  it,  but  he  keeps  his  soul  set  on  the  vision  of 
the  Church  Invisible  in  which  the  saints  of  all  ages  are 
members  with  him,  and  in  that  vision  he  lives. 

There  must  also  be  a  loosening  of  the  hold  on  "  the 
world "  to  prepare  a  saint  of  this  type.  There  must  at 
least  be  no  rivalry  to  disturb  the  concentration  of  soul 
on  eternal  Realities.  The  very  rigour  of  renunciation,  the 
stern  demands  of  a  religion  which  cuts  its  adherents  off 
from  primrose  paths  of  life,  seem  almost  essential  to  the 
creation  of  this  kind  of  saintliness.  It  is  only  by  strict 
parallelism  with  celestial  currents,  only  by  drawing  on 
invisible  and  inexhaustible  resources  of  Grace,  only  by 
the  cultivation  of  a  finer  spiritual  perception  than  most 
possess  that  inward  grace  and  central  calm  are  achieved  ; 
only  by  stillness  and  communion  that  spiritual  poise  and 
power  are  won.  There  were,  in  the  days  of  which  I  am 
writing,  many  Friends  who  had  found  the  secret  inner 
way  into  a  real  Holy  of  Holies.  They  had  learned  how 
to  live  from  within  outward,  how  to  be  refreshed  with 
inward  bubblings,  how  to  walk  their  hard  straight  path 
with  shining  faces,  though  they  wist  not  their  faces  did 
shine.  The  Quakers  have  no  "  calendar,"  no  bead  roll, 
and  they  have  always  been  shy  and  cautious  even  of  the 
word  "saint,"  but  almost  every  Meeting  from  Maine  to 
South  Carolina  had  during  the  period  under  review  some 
persons  who  through  help  from  Above  refined  and  sub 
limated  their  nature  and  all  unconsciously  grew  sweet 
and  fragrant  with  the  odour  of  saintly  life. 

5.  One  other  positive  contribution  which  they  made 
to  genuine  spiritual  religion  remains  to  be  catalogued — 
their  contribution  to  the  spread  of  lay-religion,  by  which 
I  mean  a  form  of  religion  dissociated  from  ecclesiasticism, 
and  penetrating  the  life  and  activities  of  ordinary  men. 


INTRODUCTION  xxxi 

The  real  power  of  Quakerism  lay  in  the  quality  of  life 
produced  in  the  rank  and  file  of  the  membership.  This 
history  is  weak,  no  doubt,  in  biographies  of  luminous 
leaders  who  rose  far  above  the  group  and  stood  out  as 
distinct  peaks.  Colonial  Quakerism  would  have  proved 
a  barren  field  for  a  Carlyle,  who  assumed  that  history  is 
the  biography  of  heroes,  raised  by  their  genius  head  and 
shoulders  above  the  level  of  their  contemporaries.  The 
real  glory  of  this  movement  was  the  "  levelling  up "  of 
an  entire  people.  Farmers,  with  hands  made  rough  by 
the  plough-handle,  in  hundreds  of  rural  localities  not  only 
preached  messages  of  spiritual  power  on  meeting -days, 
but,  what  is  more  to  the  point,  lived  daily  lives  of  radiant 
goodness  in  simple  neighbourhood  service.  Women  who 
had  slight  chances  for  culture,  and  who  had  to  do  the 
hard  work  of  pioneer  housewifery,  by  some  subtle 
spiritual  alchemy,  were  transformed  into  a  virile  saint 
hood  which  made  its  power  felt  both  in  the  Sunday 
gathering  and  in  the  unordained  care  of  souls  through 
out  the  community.  It  was  a  real  experiment  in  the 
"  priesthood  of  believers,"  and  it  was  an  incipient  stage 
of  what  has  become  one  of  the  most  powerful  spiritualis 
ing  forces  in  our  country — the  unordained  lay  ministry 
of  a  vast  multitude  of  men  and  women  who  have  attacked 
every  form  of  entrenched  evil,  and  who,  in  city  and 
country,  are  taking  up  the  "  cure  of  souls "  with  insight 
and  efficiency. 

It  will  be  obvious  to  the  reader  that  this  book  is  not 
written  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  antiquarian.  The 
historical  facts  have  been  carefully  gathered,  sifted,  and 
verified,  and  they  are  as  accurate  as  research  could  make 
them,  but  the  central  interest  from  first  to  last  has  been 
to  discover  how  a  group  of  men  and  women  wrought 
out  their  souls'  faith  in  an  earlier  century.  They  were 
persons  who  believed  that  within  the  deeps  of  themselves 
they  touched  the  Infinite,  that  within  their  own  spirits 
they  could  hear  the  living  word  of  the  Eternal.  They 
believed  this  mighty  thing,  and  they  tried  to  make  their 
belief  real  in  life  and  word  and  deed.  It  is  worth  while 


xxxii   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 

perhaps  even  in  this  busy  age  to  stop  amid  the  din  of 
commercial  activity  to  see  how  plain  people,  raised  to 
a  kind  of  grandeur  by  their  faith,  tried  to  bring  to  the 
world  once  again  a  religion  of  life,  and  endeavoured  to 
show  that  God  is,  as  of  old,  an  Immanuel  God — with  us 
and  in  us,  the  Life  of  our  lives. 


BOOK   I 

THE   QUAKERS    IN    NEW   ENGLAND 


B 


CHAPTER   I 

A    PRE-QUAKER    MOVEMENT 

THE  beginnings  of  our  American  colonies  are,  for  the 
most  part,  inextricably  bound  up  with  the  history  of  the 
differentiation  and  development  of  great  religious  move 
ments  in  England  and  on  the  continent  of  Europe.  The 
tiny  commonwealths,  brought  hither  in  sailing  vessels  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  were  begotten  in  religious  faith, 
and  were  formed  and  shaped  by  zealous  men  to  whom 
some  peculiar  type  of  religion  was  dearer  than  country, 
more  precious  even  than  life  itself.  The  story  of  colonial 
America  can  no  more  be  told  with  religion  left  out  than 
it  could  be  told  with  the  economic  aspects  of  soil  and 
forests  and  food-stuffs  omitted,  or  with  the  fact  of  Indian 
neighbours  neglected.  As  it  was  religion  that  was  in 
most  cases  the  creative  spring  which  pushed  these 
colonists  to  sea  in  their  venturous  ships,  so  too  it  was 
for  many  years  religion  which  shaped  the  policies,  supplied 
the  controlling  ideas,  and  furnished  the  fundamental 
interests  of  these  forefathers  of  our  national  life. 

I  am  not  here  undertaking  the  large  task  of  studying 
the  religious  development  of  colonial  America,  but  I 
shall  be  quite  satisfied  if  I  can  well  perform  the  simpler 
task  of  telling  the  story — surely  complex  and  intricate 
enough — of  one  single  religious  movement  which  pro 
foundly  influenced  the  course  of  American  history,  and 
powerfully  affected  the  personal  lives  of  the  citizens  in 
nearly  all  the  original  colonies, — I  mean  the  coming  of 
the  Quakers. 

The  first  Quakers  to  land  on  American  soil  were  two 

3 


4      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

women,  named  Mary  Fisher  and  Ann  Austin,1  who  came 
from  England  by  way  of  Barbadoes,  and  who  landed  in  the 
city  of  Boston  on  the  I  ith  of  July  1656,  to  the  consterna 
tion  of  the  magistrates  of  this  Puritan  town,  then  twenty-six 
years  old.  George  Bishop's  statement,  addressed  to  the 
magistrates  in  1 660,  is  hardly  an  exaggeration :  "  Two 
poor  women  arriving  in  your  harbour,  so  shook  ye,  to 
the  everlasting  shame  of  you,  and  of  your  established 
peace  and  order,  as  if  a  formidable  army  had  invaded 
your  borders." 2 

To  understand  why  the  arrival  of  these  "  two  poor 
women  "  of  the  Quaker  faith  produced  such  consternation 
in  the  peaceful  town,  we  must  go  back  and  pass  in  review 
a  very  famous  and  important  religious  movement  in 
Massachusetts  history.  It  is  important  here  for  two 
reasons :  first  because  it  illustrates  admirably  the  way  in 
which  the  Puritan  colonists  dealt  with  persons  who  laid 
claim  to  a  present  revelation,  an  immediate  experience 
of  Divine  communications  ;  and  secondly,  because  it  was 
a  direct  preparation  for  the  spread  and  propagation  of 
Quakerism.  I  refer  to  the  story  of  Anne  Hutchinson 
and  her  "  party " — often  called,  though  unfairly,  the 
"  Antinomian  controversy."  This  controversy,  as  all  our 
primary  authorities  admit,  came  near  disrupting  the 
colony  even  while  it  was  in  its  swaddling  clothes,  and 
it  seriously  threatened  to  frustrate  the  plans  of  the 
founders.  It  was  the  most  dangerous  storm  the  nascent 
Puritan  commonwealth  weathered,  for  Pequots  and 
Narragansetts  never  brought  the  Colony  to  such  a  close 
strait  as  did  this  woman's  tongue  and  wit. 

The  whole  controversy  arose  over  the  nature  and 
extent  of  the  Divine  influence  on  the  human  soul.  Anne 
Hutchinson,  the  chief  actor  in  this  somewhat  tragic 
drama,  was  born  about  1590,  being  the  daughter  of 
Francis  Marbury,  a  well-known  London  preacher.  She 
was  married  to  William  Hutchinson  about  1612,  and 

1  Elizabeth  Harris  came  to  Maryland  the  same  year,  but  apparently  slightly 
later.  See  chapter  on  "The  Planting  of  Quakerism  in  the  Southern  Colonies." 

8  Bishop's  New  England  Judged  (edition  of  1703),  p.  7.  The  first  edition 
was  published  in  1661,  but  this  is  extremely  rare. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  5 

passed  the  next  twenty  years  of  her  married  life  quietly 
at  Alford  in  Lincolnshire,  where  she  listened,  as  occasion 
offered,  with  great  satisfaction  and  admiration  to  the 
preaching  of  John  Cotton,  minister  of  St  Botolph's 
church  in  English  Boston.  He  migrated  to  Boston  in 
New  England  in  1633,  and  William  Hutchinson  and  his 
wife  followed  him  to  the  New  World  in  the  autumn  of 
the  next  year,  their  oldest  son,  Edward,  having  already 
accompanied  John  Cotton. 

John  Winthrop  tells  us  that  Mrs.  Hutchinson  was  "  a 
woman  of  a  ready  wit  and  bold  spirit." l  John  Wheel 
wright,  her  brother-in-law  and  fellow-sufferer,  says :  "  As 
for  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  she  was  a  woman  of  good  wit,  and 
not  only  so,  but  naturally  of  good  judgment  too,  as 
appeared  in  her  civil  occasions.  In  spirituals,  indeed, 
she  gave  her  understanding  over  into  the  power  of 
[inward]  suggestion  and  immediate  dictates."2  Cotton 
Mather,  imitating  an  earlier  account,  sets  her  down  as 
possessing  "  an  haughty  carriage,  busie  spirit,  competent 
wit,  and  a  voluble  tongue " — "  a  non-such  among  the 
people."3  Thomas  Welde,  her  most  unrelenting  and 
ingenious  foe,  informs  us  that  she  had  "  a  haughty  and 
fierce  carriage,  a  nimble  wit  and  active  spirit,  and  was 
more  bold  than  a  man,  the  breeder  and  nourisher  of  all 
distempers,"  and  he  does  not  neglect  to  mention  her 
"  voluble  tongue  "  and  he  thinks  that  her  "  understanding 
and  judgment "  were  "  inferior  to  those  of  many  women."  4 
Johnson  declares  that  she  was  "the  masterpiece  of 
women's  wit ! " 5 

There  is  also  a  like  consensus  of  opinion  upon  her 
social  helpfulness  and  sympathetic  spirit.  She  was  a 
gifted  nurse  and  peculiarly  skilful  in  dealing  with 
"ailments  peculiar  to  her  sex."  She  was  the  person 

1  Winthrop's  History  of  New  England  from  i6jo  to  1649,  edited  by  James 
Savage  (Boston,  1853),  vol.  i.  p.  239. 

2  Mercurius  Americanus,   printed  in  Bell's  John    Wheelwright,   Prince  Soc. 
Pub.  (Boston,  1876),  p.  197. 

3  Mather's  Magnalia  (Hartford,    1853),  vol.  ii.  pp.  516  and  517.     Mather  is 
here  following  Welde. 

4  Welde's  Rise,  Reign,  and  Ruin  of  Antinomians,  etc.,  ist  ed.  1644,  p.  31. 
6  Johnson's  Wonder-working  Providence,  lib.  i.  c.  42. 


6     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES       BK.  i 

instinctively  sent  for  at  times  of  childbirth,  and  she 
knew  how  to  penetrate  into  the  mysteries  of  morbid  states 
and  mental  and  spiritual  troubles  which  abounded  under 
the  new  and  hard  conditions  of  frontier  life.  Even 
Welde,  for  whom  she  is  "  the  American  Jezebel,"  admits 
that  she  was  "  a  woman  very  helpful  in  time  of  child 
birth  and  other  occasions  of  bodily  disease,  and  well 
furnished  with  means  for  those  purposes."1  She  had 
thus  a  natural  entree  to  women's  hearts,  and  possessed 
as  she  was  of  sympathy,  kindliness,  manifold  interests, 
and  withal  of  that  indescribable  trait  which  we  name 
"  magnetism,"  she  was  destined  to  play  an  important 
rdle  in  the  new  settlement.2 

This  gentlewoman,  admitted  by  all  authorities  to  have 
possessed  a  brilliant  mind  and  kindly  nature,  and  as 
certainly  possessed  of  a  genuine  passion  for  a  religion 
of  vital  reality  and  inward  power,  hit  upon  the  plan  of 
holding  a  "women's  meeting"  at  her  house  each  week, 
for  the  primary  purpose  of  presenting  the  substance  of 
the  previous  Sunday  sermon  to  the  women  of  the  com 
munity  who  had  been  prevented  from  attending  the 
original  service.  This  meeting  opened  to  her  exactly  the 
career  for  which  her  talents  and  gifts  fitted  her,  and  she 
very  quickly  became  "  a  burning  and  a  shining  light "  in 
this  little  circle  of  women.  We  can  hardly  imagine, 
with  our  crowded,  complex  lives,  how  monotonous  and 
limited  were  the  lives  of  the  women  in  those  primitive 
days.  The  absorbing  interests  for  them  were  the  neigh 
bourhood  "  news,"  and  the  affairs  of  the  Church,  even 
down  to  the  details  of  the  "  headings  "  of  the  last  Sunday 
sermon,  or  the  last  Thursday  "  lecture  "  ! 

There  is  little  ground  for  assuming,  as  so  many 
writers  have  done,  that  Anne  Hutchinson  was  insatiably 
"ambitious"  and  "light-headed."  She  simply  had  the 
wit  to  start  a  movement  which  struck  a  line  of  native 
interest  in  the  community  and  which  peculiarly  suited 
her  own  gifts  and  genius,  and  the  natural  results  followed. 

1  Welde,  op.  cit.  p.  31. 

2  See.  for  a  sketch  of  her  character,  G.  E.  Ellis's  Puritan  Age  in  Massachusetts, 
pp.  307  seq. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  7 

The  "  women's  meeting "  proved  to  be  as  popular  as  the 
modern  fads  which  sweep  like  a  contagion  through  our 
present-day  social  circles,  and,  almost  before  she  knew  it, 
she  found  herself  a  person  to  be  reckoned  with  throughout 
the  little  commonwealth,  and  the  leading  influence  in  the 
town  of  Boston.1  The  Hutchinson  "  meeting,"  by  an 
almost  unconscious  propulsion,  soon  passed  beyond  its 
original  scope,  which  was  to  review  and  comment  upon 
the  sermon  of  the  preceding  Sunday.  The  leader  began 
to  compare  sermons,  and  to  mark  off  one  type  of 
religious  teaching  which  they  heard  from  the  Rev.  John 
Cotton  as  higher  than  another  type  which  they  heard  from 
the  Rev.  John  Wilson ;  and  little  by  little  she  herself 
became  the  prophet  and  expounder  of  the  "  higher 
type,"  with  the  imminent  danger  of  brewing  ecclesiastical 
jealousies. 

The  important  point  now  is  to  get  before  us  a  clear 
conception  of  these  two  types  of  religion  upon  which 
the  community  was  cleaving  into  two  parties.  Most 
modern  writers  give  up  the  distinction  as  hopeless,  and 
tell  us  that  the  whole  controversy  was  a  notorious  instance 
of  "  confused  theological  jargon,"  out  of  which  nobody, 
either  then  or  now,  could,  or  can,  make  any  clear  sense. 
It  is  true  that  Winthrop's  account  is  full  of  confusion, 
and  that  he  himself  says  :  "  No  man  could  tell  (except 
some  few,  who  knew  the  bottom  of  the  matter)  where  any 
difference  was." 2  And  yet  as  soon  as  we  go  for  light  to 
the  actual  words  of  the  main  actors  themselves,  we  find 
that  those  of  the  Hutchinson  party  were  champions  of  a 
type  of  religion  sharply  differentiated  from  that  expounded 
and  exhibited  by  the  clergymen  of  the  Colony,  excepting 
only  John  Cotton,  with  whom  Anne  Hutchinson  was  well 
pleased,  and  John  Wheelwright,  her  brother-in-law. 

The  two  types  were  named  respectively  "  a  covenant 
of  Grace,"  and  "a  covenant  of  Works."  The  foremost 
exponents  of  the  former  type  were  Anne  Hutchinson 
herself;  her  brother-in-law  the  Rev.  John  Wheelwright, 

1  Winthrop  says  :   "  All  the  congregation  of  Boston,  except  four  or  five,  closed 
with  [her]  opinions. "     Op.  cit.  vol.  i.  p.  252. 
3  Op.  cit.  vol.  i.  p.  255- 


8      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

pastor  of  the  little  congregation  at  Mount  Wollaston  (now 
Braintree) ;  Sir  Harry  Vane,  then  Governor  of  the  Colony  ; 
and  the  Rev.  John  Cotton,  the  most  shining  intellectual 
light  at  that  time  on  the  American  continent.  He,  how 
ever,  drew  back  when  the  movement  reached  the  perilous 
edge,  and  took  his  place,  whether  honourably  or  dishonour 
ably,  among  the  opposers  of  the  "  new  opinions."  There 
were  many  prominent  persons,  besides  the  "  exponents," 
who  were  warm  sympathisers  with  the  "  new  opinions," 
and  who  shared  the  opprobrium  and  penalties  which  were 
meted  out  to  those  who  dared  to  think  for  themselves 
and  to  diverge  from  the  beaten  track  of  the  prevailing 
theology.  The  most  noted  of  these  sympathisers  were 
William  Coddington,  John  Coggeshall,  William  Aspinwall, 
Nicholas  Easton,  Mary  Dyer,  and  Captain  John  Underhill 
(a  somewhat  serio-comic  actor  in  the  drama),  some  of 
whom,  with  many  more  here  unnamed,  will  reappear  in 
the  Quaker  ranks.  The  leaders  of  the  opposition  forces 
were  John  Winthrop,  the  loftiest  figure  in  that  colonial 
commonwealth,  though  for  the  moment  superseded  in  the 
governorship  ;  Rev.  John  Wilson,  pastor  of  Boston  ;  Rev. 
Hugh  Peters,  pastor  of  Salem,  and  later  prominent  in 
the  greater  drama  of  the  Civil  War  in  England  ;  John 
Endicott,  and  Thomas  Dudley,  both  of  large  fame  in  the 
governorship  ;  Rev.  Thomas  Welde,  the  ungentle  historian 
of  the  controversy,  and  all  the  other  ministers  of  the 
Colony. 

The  real  issue,  as  I  see  it  in  the  fragments  that  are 
preserved,  was  an  issue  between  what  we  nowadays  call 
"  religion  of  the  first-hand  type,"  and  "  religion  of  the 
second-hand  type,"  that  is  to  say,  a  religion  on  the  one 
hand  which  insists  on  "  knowledge  of  acquaintance " 
through  immediate  experience,  and  a  religion  on  the 
other  hand  which  magnifies  the  importance  and  sufficiency 
of  "  knowledge  about."  Anne  Hutchinson  precipitated 
the  controversy  by  an  assertion — under  the  existing 
circumstances  as  certain  to  produce  a  furious  controversy 
as  a  flaming  firebrand  in  dry  prairie  grass  is  sure  to 
produce  a  conflagration — that  John  Cotton  preached  a 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  9 

covenant  of  Grace,  and  that  the  other  ministers  of  the 
Colony  preached  a  covenant  of  Works.1 

This  latter  phrase,  which  was  a  coinage  of  the  Reform 
ation,  had  come  to  mean  a  legal  system  of  religion,  or 
what  St.  Paul  branded  as  "  a  religion  of  the  letter " — 
a  thing  of  "  beggarly  elements."  Those  who  used  the 
phrase  intended  it  to  characterise  a  form  of  religion  which 
consisted  essentially  in  a  system  of  correct  views,  in  the 
acceptance  of  a  set  of  Divine  commandments  and  sacred 
ceremonies,  and  the  aim  to  live  a  life  of  strict  obedience 
to  this  elaborate,  divinely  communicated  system.  Worship 
under  this  system  is  based  on  the  commands  of  the 
covenant ;  it  is  not  something  springing  out  of  the  inward 
disposition  of  the  worshipper.  It  was  one  of  the  central 
features  of  this  "  system  "  that  the  relation  between  God 
and  man  was  a  relation  of  covenant.  By  the  "  fall,"  the 
direct  fellowship-relation  with  God  had  been  broken  and 
annulled.  God  was  no  longer  Friend  but  just  Judge. 
This  Judge,  instead  of  destroying  the  sinful  race,  made 
a  covenant,  in  which  He  showed  His  mercy  and  opened 
the  way  of  escape  for  man.  This  covenant,  set  forth  in 
the  Holy  Scriptures,  contains  a  full,  complete,  and  final 
expression  of  God's  will  and  requirements  —  all  that 
pertains  to  life  and  salvation.  Man's  part  is,  not  to 
question  why,  not  to  pry  into  the  inscrutable  will,  but  to 
comply  strictly  with  the  terms  of  the  covenant.  Under  this 
covenant  the  "  minister,"  by  whatever  name  he  may  be 
called,  is  an  exalted  personage,  quite  in  a  class  apart. 
He  is  the  official  interpreter  of  the  terms  and  the  meaning 
of  the  covenant.  He  is  the  mouthpiece  of  the  covenant- 
maker,  the  highest  spokesman  of  the  will  revealed  in  the 
covenant.  The  simple  point  for  us  is  this,  that  Anne 
Hutchinson  did  not  like  that  type  of  religion — it  was 
to  her  mind  only  "  legalism,"  mere  "  letter,"  and  it  left 
the  inward  life  unchanged  and  untransformed,  however 

1  The  proceedings  of  the  "  Examination  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson  "  are  given  in  an 
Appendix  to  Hutchinson's  Massachusetts  Bay,  ii.  482-520.  My  statement  is 
founded  on  Hugh  Peters's  testimony  (p.  491).  Mrs.  Hutchinson  claimed  that 
Peters  did  not  report  her  fairly.  But  the  evidence  is  clear  that  she  did  make 
these  two  classes  :  those  in  the  covenant  of  Grace  and  those  in  the  covenant 
of  Works. 


io     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

correct  the  outward  conformity  might  be  ;  and  she  boldly 
announced  this  type  of  religion  to  be  actually  existing 
in  the  Colony,  and  to  be  supported  by  all  the  ministers 
except  John  Wheelwright,  her  brother-in-law,  and  John 
Cotton,  "  teacher  "  in  the  Boston  church. 

Against  this  legalistic  religion  of  rules  and  command 
ments,  with  its  remote,  absentee  God,  she  set  what  she 
called  the  "  covenant  of  Grace."  By  this  she  meant,  and 
so  did  her  contemporaries,  a  religion  grounded  in  a  direct 
experience  of  God's  grace  and  redeeming  love,  a  religion 
not  of  pious  performances,  of  solemn  fasts  and  sombre 
faces,  of  painful  search  after  the  exact  requirements  of 
the  law,  but  a  religion  which  began  and  ended  in 
triumphant  certainty  of  Divine  forgiveness,  Divine  fellow 
ship,  and  present  Divine  illumination. 

Winthrop  tells  us  that  "  Mrs.  Hutchinson  brought  over 
with  her  two  dangerous  errors:  (i)  That  the  Person  of 
the  Holy  Ghost  dwells  in  a  justified  person.  (2)  That 
no  sanctification  can  help  to  evidence  our  justification."  I 
I  admit  that  this  second  "  error  "  sounds  like  "  theological 
jargon,"  but  it  is  only  a  seventeenth  -  century  way  of 
saying  that  no  deeds  however  holy,  no  acts  however 
saintly,  are  in  themselves  a  sufficient  evidence  of  a  restored 
and  vital  relation  with  God  ;  or  as  John  Wheelwright  put 
it  in  his  famous  fast  -  day  sermon  :  "  There  is  nothing 
under  heaven  may  justify  any  but  the  revelation  of  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  [in  him]." 

Out  of  these  "  errors,"  Winthrop  says,  there  sprang 
the  view  that  the  Christian — the  true  Christian — is  united 
with  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  of  himself  becomes  dead  and 
"  hath  no  gifts  and  graces,  nor  other  sanctification,  but 
the  Holy  Ghost  Himself." 2 

These  "  errors  "  sound  at  this  distance  remarkably  like 
some  of  St.  Paul's  "  truths  "  ;  for  example  :  "  I  am  crucified 
with  Christ,  nevertheless  I  live  ;  yet  not  I,  Christ  liveth 
in  me."  "  Christ  is  made  unto  us  sanctification."  "  Ye 
are  builded  together  for  a  habitation  of  God  through  the 

1  Winthrop,  op.  cit.  vol.  i.  p.  239. 
a  Op.  cit.  vol.  i.  p.  239. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  1 1 

Spirit" l  John  Cotton  had,  even  before  his  coming  to 
America,  been  a  fervent  expounder  of  this  inward 
religion,  and  he  undoubtedly  held  the  essential  principles 
of  Mrs.  Hutchinson's  teaching.  William  Coddington, 
writing  to  the  magistrates  of  the  Colony  in  1672  to 
protest  against  the  persecution  of  the  Quakers,  calls  upon 
those  in  authority  to  "  turn  to  the  Light  within  you,  even 
Christ  in  you,"  and  then  he  (having  himself  been  one  of 
the  Boston  founders  who  sailed  on  the  Arbella)  adds : 
"  This  [teaching  of  inward  Light]  was  declared  unto  you 
by  the  servant  of  the  Lord,  John  Cotton,  on  his  lecture 
day,  when  the  ships  were  ready  to  depart  for  England. 
He  stated  the  difference ;  it  was  about  Grace.  He 
magnified  the  Grace  in  us ;  the  priests  [i.e.  the  other 
ministers]  the  Grace  without  or  upon  them.  All  the 
difference  in  the  country  was  about  Grace,  but  the 
difference  was  as  great,  he  said,  as  between  light  and 
darkness,  heaven  and  hell,  life  and  death." 2  Cotton  did 
not,  however,  go  as  far  as  the  other  expounders  of  "  the 
covenant  of  Grace  "  did.  He  held  for  the  "  indwelling  of 
the  Holy  Ghost"  but  not  for  a  personal  union  of  the 
believer  with  the  Holy  Ghost.3  Governor  Vane  went  to 
the  far  extreme,  and  held  the  view  that  there  is  a  personal 
union  between  the  believer  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  so  that 
a  divine  life  is  actually  begotten  in  the  soul.4 

But  the  most  important  document  in  the  controversy 
for  an  understanding  of  the  "  covenant  of  Grace "  is, 
beyond  question,  Wheelwright's  "  Fast  -  day  sermon." 
John  Wheelwright  was  born  in  the  Fen  country  of 
Lincolnshire,  probably  in  1592.  He  matriculated  at 
Cambridge  University  at  about  the  age  of  eighteen, 
receiving  his  B.A.  degree  in  1614  and  his  M.A.  in  1618. 
He  was  intimately  associated  with  Oliver  Cromwell,  and 
the  Protector  once  made  the  remark  :  "  I  remember  the 
time  when  I  was  more  afraid  of  meeting  Wheelwright 

1  Gal.  ii.  20  ;  i  Cor.  i.  30 ;  Eph.  ii.  22. 

2  William  Coddington's  A  Demonstration  of  True  Love  (1674),  p.  17.     Com 
pare  Winthrop's  account  of  this  sermon,  vol.  i.  p.  254. 

*  Winthrop,  op,  cit.  vol.  i.  p.  240. 
4  Winthrop,  op.  cit.  voL  i.  p.  246. 


12     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

at  football,  than  I  have  been  since  of  meeting  an  army 
in  the  field,  for  I  was  infallibly  sure  of  being  tripped 
up."1 

He  had  a  successful  career  as  vicar  of  Bilsby,  where 
"  he  was  instrumental  in  the  conversion  of  many  souls, 
and  was  highly  esteemed  among  serious  Christians." z 
He  was,  however,  "  silenced "  for  nonconformity,  and  his 
vicarage  was  treated  "  as  though  vacant "  and  his  successor 
appointed  in  1633,  ten  years  from  the  time  of  his  installa 
tion.3  He  landed  in  Boston  in  May  1636,  being  now 
married  to  his  second  wife,  Mary,  the  daughter  of  Edward 
Hutchinson,  a  sister  of  William  Hutchinson,  husband  of 
Anne.  There  was  a  strong  movement  made  to  appoint 
Wheelwright  a  "teacher"  in  the  church  of  Boston,  but 
this  plan  was  blocked  by  the  vigorous  opposition  of 
Winthrop,  who  questioned  his  "  soundness,"  asserting  that 
he  [Wheelwright]  held  the  views  that :  ( I )  "  a  believer 
was  more  than  a  creature,"  i.e.  partook  of  God  in  such 
a  way  as  to  be  more  than  "a  mere  creature,"  and  (2) 
"  that  the  Person  of  the  Holy  Ghost  and  a  believer  were 
united." 4  He  was,  therefore,  settled  at  Mount  Wollaston. 
On  the  2 Qth  of  January  1636,  Wheelwright  was  invited 
to  preach  the  fast-day  sermon  in  the  Boston  church, 
which  sermon  led  to  his  banishment  from  the  colony.5 
His  text  was  taken  from  Matt.  ix.  1 5,  "  Can  the  children 
of  the  bridechamber  mourn  as  long  as  the  bridegroom  is 
with  them?"  He  first  points  out  that  the  reason  for 
fasting  is  always  the  absence  of  Christ,  since  the  real 
ground  for  joy  and  rejoicing  is  the  presence  of  Christ 
It  is,  he  claims,  not  enough  to  have  the  gifts  of  the  Spirit, 
we  must  have  the  Lord  Himself;  not  enough  to  seek 
from  the  Lord  "  fruits  and  effects,"  but  we  must  "  see 
Him  with  a  direct  eye  of  faith  and  seek  His  Face."  "  If 
we  part  with  Christ  we  part  with  our  life,  for  Christ  is 

1  Bell's  John  Wheelwright,  p.  2. 

8  Brooks's  Lives  of  the  Puritans,  p.  472. 

*  Winthrop  calls  him  "  a  silenced  minister, "  vol.  i.  p.  239. 

4  Winthrop,  vol.  i.  p.  241.  Wheelwright  himself  denied  holding  the  views  as 
attributed  to  him  by  Winthrop,  op.  cit.  vol.  i.  p.  242. 

8  Winthrop,  vol.  i.  pp.  256-257.  The  sermon  is  printed  in  full  in  Bell's 
John  Wheelwright. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  13 

our  life  " — not  merely  "  the  author  of  our  lives,"  but  the 
very  root  of  our  being,  the  very  Life  of  our  life.1 

It  is  not  enough  to  be  under  a  covenant  of  Works, 
we  must  have  Christ  Himself — His  very  presence.  The 
true  Gospel  is  the  revelation  of  Jesus  Christ  as  our 
wisdom,  our  righteousness,  our  sanctification  and  redemp 
tion.  We  can  attain  to  nothing  truly  spiritual  until  He 
comes  into  us  with  His  righteousness,  and  becomes  Him 
self  our  redemption.  He  is  the  Well  of  life  of  which 
the  wells  in  the  Old  Testament  were  types.  If  the 
Philistines  fill  the  Well  with  earth — the  earth  of  their 
own  inventions — the  servants  of  the  Lord  must  open  the 
Well  again  ! 2 

He  is  the  Light  that  lighteth  every  one  that  cometh 
into  the  world,  and  if  we  expect  to  keep  Christ,  we  must 
hold  forth  this  Light.  There  is  nothing  under  heaven 
can  justify  any  one  but  the  revelation  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  within  him,  and  when  He  converts  any  soul  to 
Himself  He  reveals,  not  some  Work,  but  Himself.  To 
look  for  salvation  by  anything  short  of  Christ  Himself 
is  a  covenant  of  Works,  for  under  the  covenant  of  Grace 
nothing  is  revealed  for  our  righteousness  but  Christ 
Himself.  This  experience  enables  the  soul  to  know  that 
it  is  justified,  for  the  faith  of  assurance  hath  Christ  for 
its  object.  He  gives  a  new  heart  through  His  working 
in  us.  This  is  the  covenant  of  Grace.3 

He  admits  that  those  under  the  covenant  of  Grace, 
i.e.  those  who  have  the  inward,  mystical  experience,  are 
few  in  number,  "  a  little  flock,"  while  those  under  the 
covenant  of  Works  are  strong  in  numbers,  but  one  in 
the  life  shall  chase  a  thousand.4  He  admits  also  that 
those  under  a  covenant  of  Works — the  legalists,  or  letter 
Christians — are  in  appearance  "  a  wondrous  holy  people," 
but  the  more  "  holy "  they  appear  the  more  dangerous 

1  Bell,  John  Wheelwright,  pp.  158-159. 

2  Ibid,  pp.  161-163. 

3  Ibid.  pp.  164-167. 

4  It  is  interesting  to  find  that  Wm.  Dewsbury,  who  came  to  see  the  Wood- 
house  sail  for  America  in  1657  with  its  load  of  Quaker  apostles,  said  :    "  Before 
one  of  you  that  is  in  the  Resurrection  and  Life  in  Christ,  shall  a  thousand  flee 
.  .  .  for  you  in  the  life  are  the  host  of  Heaven." — Dewsbury's  Works,  p.  171. 


14     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES     UK.  i 

they  are,  for  when  Christ,  who  is  our  real  sanctification, 
comes  to  the  soul  He  makes  "  the  creature  nothing." 

He  admits  further  that  this  spiritual  doctrine  will 
"  cause  combustion  in  the  Church,"  but  did  not  Christ 
come  to  cast  fire  upon  the  earth  !  Peace  and  quietness 
are  not  the  things  to  be  most  sought — but  the  truth  of 
God.  "  To  fight  courageously  for  the  Lord  and  to  be 
meek  are  not  opposites,  but  stand  very  well  together." 
If  the  call  for  it  comes,  we  must  be  willing  to  lay  down 
our  lives  to  make  the  truth  prevail.1 

Those  who  wish  to  enjoy  the  presence  of  Christ  must 
(i)  be  faithful  in  life  and  word;  (2)  be  full  of  love;  and 
(3)  "live  pure  and  blameless  lives  and  give  no  occasion  for 
others  to  say  that  we  are  libertines  or  Antinomians  \  "  The 
greatest  "  friends "  of  the  Church  and  of  the  common 
wealth  are  those  who  hold  forth  Christ  Himself,  and 
who  labour  and  endeavour  to  bring  Him  to  the  hearts 
of  the  people.  The  supreme  sin  is  opposition  to  the 
Light  and  persecution  of  those  who  bring  the  Light. 
Those  who  have  the  real  presence  are  in  happy  estate. 
If  they  lose  their  houses,  and  lands,  and  wives,  and 
friends,  or  even  lose  religious  ordinances,  yet  they  cannot 
lose  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ — this  is  their  great  comfort. 
Though  they  should  lose  all  they  have,  yet  being  made 
one  with  Christ  and  He  dwelling  in  their  hearts,  they 
cannot  be  separated  from  Him.8 

This  sermon  should  leave  no  doubt  in  anybody's  mind 
as  to  what  the  issue  was.  It  was  the  old  yet  ever  new 
issue  between  a  religion  of  the  past  and  a  religion  of  the 
present,  a  religion  based  on  historical  facts  and  promises 
and  a  religion  based  on  inward  personal  experience. 

At  the  General  Court,  which  convened  on  the  ipth  of 
March,  attended  by  all  the  ministers  in  the  Colony, 
Wheelwright  was  summoned,  proceeded  against,  and 

1  Bell,  John  Wheelwright,  pp.  167-171. 

z  No  occasion  did  appear,  except  possibly  in  the  case  of  Captain  Underbill, 
and  yet  the  slanderous  epithet  of  ' '  Antinomianism  "  was  fixed  upon  the  movement. 
Cotton  Mather  admits  that  the  "  opinionists, "  as  he  calls  them,  "appeared 
wondrous  holy,  humble,  self-denying,  and  spiritual." — Magnolia  (Hartford,  1853), 
vol.  ii.  p.  509. 

*  Bell,  John  Wheelwright,  pp.  175-179. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  1 5 

condemned  for  having  incited  sedition  and  having  shown 
contempt  in  his  fast- day  sermon.  The  action  against 
Wheelwright  aroused  the  citizens  of  Boston,  and  they 
presented  a  remonstrance  signed  by  "  above  three  score  " 
leading  persons  in  the  town,  in  which  petition  they 
respectfully  declared  that  the  doctrine  by  "our  brother 
Wheelwright  is  no  other  but  the  expressions  of  the  Holy 
Ghost  Himself,"  and  they  claim  that  the  effect  of  his 
sermon  has  not  been  to  incite  sedition,  "  for  wee  have  not 
drawn  the  sword  as  sometime  Peter  did  rashly,  neither 
have  wee  rescued  our  innocent  brother  as  sometime  the 
Israelites  did  Jonathan,  and  yet  they  did  not  seditiously. 
The  covenant  of  Grace  held  forth  by  our  brother  hath 
taught  us  rather  to  become  humble  suppliants  to  your 
worships,  and  if  wee  should  not  prevaile,  wee  should  rather 
with  patience  give  our  cheeks  to  the  smiter." l 

Sentence  against  Wheelwright  was  deferred  to  the 
next  General  Court.  The  case,  however,  hung  on  for 
months,  was  thoroughly  canvassed  in  a  Synod,  and 
finally  in  November  1637  the  Court  pronounced  sentence 
of  banishment,  giving  the  victim  fourteen  days  "  to  settle 
his  affairs  "  and  "  depart  the  Patent." 2  Alone  and  hardly 
knowing  whither  he  went,  the  exile  made  his  difficult 
way  to  Exeter,  New  Hampshire,  in  a  weather  so  intense 
that,  as  he  humorously  writes,  "  the  very  extract-spirits  of 
sedition  and  contempt,"  had  they  been  in  him,  "  would 
have  been  frozen  up  and  indisposed  for  action." 3 

We  must  go  back  now  to  the  case  of  Anne  Hutchin- 
son,  for  her  views  come  more  clearly  to  light  through  the 
proceedings  against  her,  which  accompanied  and  followed 
those  against  her  brother-in-law.  A  Synod  of  all  the 
ministers  in  the  Colony — the  first  ever  held  in  America — 
met  at  Cambridge,  beginning  the  Qth  of  September  1637, 
and  lasting  twenty-four  days,  to  thresh  out  the  theological 
differences.  All  the  "  opinions  "  at  issue  were  gone  over 
in  minute  detail.  The  result  was  that  "eighty-two 
opinions "  were  discovered  and  declared  to  be  "  some 
blasphemous,  others  erroneous,  and  all  unsafe,"  besides 

1  Bell,  p.  21.         2  Mercurius  Americanus,  Bell,  p.  228.         s  Ibid.  p.  228. 


16     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

"  nine  unwholesome  expressions,"  and  "  the  Scriptures 
abused."  Mrs.  Hutchinson's  "  meetings,"  being  of  a 
"  prophetical  way,"  were  voted  to  be  a  nuisance  and 
"  without  rule." 

The  further  definite  results  were  the  sentence  against 
Wheelwright  at  the  following  General  Court,  as  we  have 
seen,  and  the  trial  at  the  same  Court  of  Anne  Hutchin- 
son.  This  Court  met,  also  at  Cambridge,  on  the  1 2th  of 
November  1637.  Before  it,  with  John  Winthrop  pre 
siding,  and  with  only  three  sympathisers  in  the  company 
of  men  composing  it — John  Coggeshall,  Thomas  Leverett, 
and  William  Coddington — Anne  Hutchinson  appeared  to 
defend  herself.  The  charges  brought  against  her  were  : 
(i)  "Of  having  troubled  the  peace  of  the  commonwealth 
and  churches."  (2)  "  Of  having  divulged  and  promoted 
opinions  that  cause  trouble."  (3)  "Of  having  joined  in 
affinity  and  affection  to  those  upon  whom  the  Court  has 
passed  censure "  [Wheelwright  and  others].  (4)  "  Of 
having  spoken  divers  things  prejudicial  to  the  honour  of 
the  Churches  and  the  ministers."  (5)  "Of  having  main 
tained  a  meeting  in  your  house,  not  comely  in  the  sight 
of  God,  nor  fitting  your  sex." 

She  was  further  charged,  absurdly,  with  having 
"  broken  the  law  against  dishonouring  parents " ;  the 
"  parents  "  in  this  case  being  the  "  fathers  of  the  common 
wealth."  She  was  also  charged  with  "  seducing  many 
honest  persons  " — "  simple  souls  " — by  "  opinions  known 
to  be  different  from  the  Word  of  God,"  and  with  leading 
such  persons  to  "  neglect  their  families "  and  to  "  spend 
\i,e.  waste]  much  time."  To  these  points,  marshalled 
by  Governor  Winthrop,  the  Deputy -Governor  Thomas 
Dudley  added  other  charges  which  are  really  "  echoes " 
of  Winthrop's.  That  "  all  was  peace  until  you  came  "  ; 
that  "  by  venting  strange  opinions  you  have  made  parties, 
and  now  have  a  potent  party  in  the  country  "  ;  and  "  that 
you  have  disparaged  our  ministers,"  which  was  really  the 
sore  spot. 

On  all  these  points  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  calm,  clear 
headed,  and  straightforward,  was  more  than  a  match  for 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  17 

her  accusers,  and  soon  forced  the  issue  deeper.  The 
Court  next  took  up  the  real  matter  at  issue — the  question 
of  the  two  types  of  religion — the  covenant  of  Works  and 
the  covenant  of  Grace.  Deputy-governor  Dudley  raised 
this  point  and  declared  that  he  could  prove  that  Mrs. 
Hutchinson  had  said  that  "  the  Gospel  in  the  letter  and 
in  words  is  only  a  covenant  of  Works,"  and  that  she  had 
claimed  that  those  not  holding  as  she  herself  did — to 
inward  experience — were  in  this  lower  stage  or  covenant.1 
Whereupon  Hugh  Peters,  the  main  witness  to  prove  this 
point,  came  forward  with  the  testimony,  based  on  a  private 
conference  which  the  ministers  had  held  with  Anne 
Hutchinson,  that  she  had  said  that  Mr.  Cotton  alone 
preached  the  covenant  of  Grace,  and  that  all  the  other 
ministers  preached  the  covenant  of  Works,  "  knowing  no 
more  than  the  apostles  did  before  the  resurrection "  [i.e. 
before  enduement  with  the  Holy  Spirit]  and  that  they 
did  not  have  "  the  seal  of  Christ."  Other  ministers 
corroborated  this  testimony,  and  Deputy-governor  Dudley 
pushed  the  charge  a  little  further  by  insisting  that  she 
affirmed  that  "  the  Scriptures  in  the  letter  held  forth  only 
a  covenant  of  Works,"  or  as  we  should  say  to-day,  are  a 
part  of  externals,  and  not  the  primary  matter  of  religion. 
She  admitted  having  said  so,  and  supported  her  point  by 
quoting  2  Cor.  iii.  6  :  "  The  letter  killeth,  but  the  Spirit 
giveth  life."2 

It  came  out,  in  a  speech  of  Hugh  Peters,  at  the  open 
ing  of  the  Court  on  the  second  day  of  the  proceedings, 
that  "  the  main  thing  against  her  is  that  she  charged  us 
with  not  being  able  ministers  of  the  Gospel,  and  of  being 
preachers  of  a  covenant  of  Works." 3  A  little  later  he 
insists  again,  that  she  said  that  "  we  ministers  are  not 
sealed  with  the  spirit  of  Grace,  that  we  preach  in 
judgment,  but  not  in  experience?  "  She  spoke  out  plump 
that  we  were  not  sealed."4 

John  Cotton,  who  was  naturally  in  a  most  delicate 
and  trying  position,  bore  his  testimony  with  much  dignity, 

1  Hutchinson,  Massachusetts  Bay,  ii.  489.  a  Ibid.  vol.  ii.  pp.  495-496. 

3  Ibid.  vol.  ii.  p.  501.  4  Ibid.  vol.  ii.  pp.  505-506. 

C 


i8     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

insight,  and  boldness.  He  said  that  Mrs.  Hutchinson 
had  not  made  such  positive  statements  as  were  now  being 
charged  against  her,  that  the  brethren  at  the  time  of  the 
conference  had  not  taken  her  words  "  so  ill  as  now,"  and 
that  there  was  an  actual  difference  between  a  religion  of 
works,  or  letter,  and  one  of  the  Spirit,  pointing  out  that 
even  the  Apostles  were  for  a  time  in  the  lower  stage, 
without  the  witness  of  the  Spirit,  and  in  that  stage  they 
had  been  unable  to  preach  the  covenant  of  Grace — a 
religion  of  experience.  He  called  to  mind  that  Mrs. 
Hutchinson  had  said,  "  You  can  preach  no  more  than  you 
know."  And  he  declared  that  by  "  the  seal  of  the  Spirit " 
she  meant  "  the  full  assurance  of  Divine  favour,  witnessed 
by  the  presence  of  the  Holy  Spirit."  l 

Anne  Hutchinson  herself,  in  a  moment  of  rashness, 
now  gave  her  enemies  the  key  to  her  inner  sanctuary, 
and  lost  her  case  by  what  Hugh  Peters  would  call  a 
"  plump  confession  "  that  she  sometimes  received  "  revela 
tions,"  had  "openings,"  and  "was  given  to  see  spiritual 
situations."  "  I  bless  the  Lord,"  she  exclaimed,  "  that 
He  has  let  me  see  which  was  clear  ministry  and  which 
was  wrong.  He  hath  let  me  distinguish  between  the 
voice  of  my  Beloved  and  the  voice  of  Moses."  "  Now," 
she  continued  solemnly,  "if  you  do  condemn  me  for 
speaking  what  in  my  conscience  I  know  to  be  the  truth,  I 
must  commit  myself  unto  the  Lord."  This  confession 
led  to  the  following  conversation  : 

Mr.  Nowel. — How  do  you  know  that  that  (which  was  re 
vealed  to  you)  was  of  the  Spirit  ? 

Mrs.  H. — How  did  Abraham  know  that  it  was  God  that 
bid  him  offer  his  son  ? 

Dep.-Gov. — By  an  immediate  voice. 

Mrs.  H. — So  to  me  by  an  immediate  revelation. 

Dep.-Gov. — How !  an  immediate  revelation  ? 

Mrs.  H. — By  the  voice  of  His  own  Spirit  in  my  soul.2 

Here  in  this  discussion  we  find  the  real  nerve  of  the 
issue.  Here  was  "  a  mere  woman  "  who  claimed  direct 
connection  with  the  fount  of  Life  and  Light,  who  insisted 

1  Hutchinson,  Massachusetts  Bay,  vol.  ii.  pp.  504,  505,  509. 

2  Ibid.  vol.  ii.  p.  508. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  19 

that  revelation  is  not  closed,  but  that  she  herself  has 
immediate  openings  like  those  given  to  Abraham.  To 
those  listening  to  her  the  claim  sounded,  as  the  wisest  of 
them,  Governor  Winthrop,  said,  like  the  "  most  desperate 
enthusiasm  in  the  world."  To  him,  to  them  all,  her 
"  confession "  seemed  "  a  marvellous  providence  of  God," 
a  clear  "  mercy  of  God "  vouchsafed  to  them.  On  her 
own  testimony  she  had  showed  herself  to  be  "  under  a 
devilish  delusion,"  near  kin  to  the  worst  enthusiasts  of 
history  —  the  Anabaptists.1  It  was  now  a  plain  and 
easy  matter  to  move  straight  toward  her  condemnation 
and  sentence. 

Before  sentence  was  pronounced,  however,  one  valiant 
voice  was  raised  in  her  behalf.  William  Coddington, 
seeing  that  judgment  was  about  to  be  pronounced, 
defended  her  with  what,  under  the  circumstances,  was 
rare  boldness.  He  pointed  out  that  the  Court  was  acting 
unfairly  in  the  double  capacity  of  judge  and  accuser,  and 
that  the  original  charges  against  her  had  not  been  proven. 
He  then  took  up  the  "  special  providence "  of  her  own 
confession  :  "  And  now  for  that  other  thing  which  hath 
fallen  from  her  occasionally  by  the  Spirit  of  God  ;  you 
know  that  the  Spirit  of  God  witnesseth  with  spirits,  and 
there  is  no  truth  in  Scripture  but  God  bears  witness  to 
it  by  His  Spirit,  therefore  I  would  intreat  you  to  consider 
whether  those  things  alleged  against  her  deserve  censure." 2 

"  But,"  insisted  Peters,  conscious  all  the  time  of  the 
real  sore  spot,  "  I  was  much  grieved  that  she  should  say 
that  our  ministry  was  legal." 

"  What  wrong  was  there,"  asked  Coddington,  "  to  say 
that  you  were  not  able  ministers  of  the  New  Testament 
or  that  you  were  like  the  apostles — methinks  the  com 
parison  was  very  good."3 

But  Coddington  was  risking  himself  in  vain  ;  her  fate 
was  already  sealed,  and  Governor  Winthrop  proceeded  to 
pronounce  sentence.  "  If  it  be  the  mind  of  the  Court 
that  Mrs.  Hutchinson  is  unfit  for  our  society,  and  if  it 

1  Hutchinson,  Massachusetts  Bay,  vol.  ii.  p.  514. 

2  Ibid.  vol.  ii.  p.  516.  3  Ibid.  vol.  ii.  p.  510. 


20     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

be  the  mind  of  the  Court  that  she  shall  be  banished  out 
of  our  liberties  and  imprisoned  until  she  shall  be  sent 
forth,  let  them  hold  up  their  hands."1  All  but  three 
voted  in  the  affirmative. 

The  victim  was  now  separated  from  her  family  and 
condemned  to  a  semi-imprisonment  in  the  house  of  the 
Rev.  Thomas  Welde  at  Roxbury,  where  she  was  hard 
beset  with  clerical  inquisition,  and  where  she  underwent 
a  good  deal  of  mental  depression.2  It  is  a  matter  of  no 
importance  that  under  this  unbearable  strain  her  clerical 
inquisitors  drew  from  her  certain  "  errors  and  heresies." 
In  the  spring  of  1637  —  2 5th  March — the  Church  of 
Boston  proceeded  to  "  excommunicate "  her.  All  her 
powerful  friends  were  silenced  now.  Governor  Vane 
had  gone  back  to  England,  glad  to  be  out  of  the  theo 
logical  tempest.  Wheelwright  was  eating  the  hard  bread 
of  exile  in  New  Hampshire.  Coddington  and  his 
sympathisers  had  been  forced  out  of  the  government 
and  out  of  the  colony.  John  Cotton  must  have  passed 
many  silent  hours  of  inward  anguish  as  he  halted  between 
the  two  issues,  but  he  finally  deserted  his  friend,  who  had 
singled  him  out  as  the  one  minister  in  the  colony  who 
clearly  preached  the  covenant  of  Grace,  and  he  swung 
over,  clear  over,  to  the  safe  side,  with  the  other  ministers, 
and  bitterly  lamented  that  he  had  been  "  abused  and  made 
a  stalking-horse  of."3  He  was  selected  to  pronounce 
"  admonition "  against  her,  which  he  did,  "  with  much 
detestation  of  her  errors,"  though  the  awful  sentence  of 
excommunication  was  read  by  the  pastor,  Mr.  Wilson  : 
"  In  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  in  the  name 
of  the  Church,  I  do  not  only  pronounce  you  worthy  to 
be  cast  out,  but  I  do  cast  you  out ;  and  in  the  name  of 
Christ  I  do  deliver  you  up  to  Satan.  I  do  account 
you  from  this  time  forth  to  be  a  heathen  and  a  publican. 
I  command  you  in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ  and  of  this 
Church  as  a  leper  to  withdraw  yourself  out  of  this 
congregation."  As  the  outcast  slowly  found  her  way 

1  Hutchinson,  Massachusetts  Bay,  vol.  ii.  p.  520. 

*  It  is  important  to  note  her  physical  condition — she  was  soon  to  give  birth 
to  a  child.  3  Winthrop,  vol.  i.  p.  304. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  21 

down  the  aisle,  to  go  out  for  ever  into  exile,  Mary  Dyer 
stepped  forth  from  her  seat,  took  her  place  by  Anne 
Hutchinson's  side  and  went  out  with  her — one  day  to 
come  back  again  ! 

Mrs.  Hutchinson  now  found  her  way  to  the  new  colony 
which  her  friends  had  gone  on  ahead  to  found  in  the 
island  of  "  Aquiday  " — Aquidneck — now  called  the  island 
of  Rhode  Island.  This  island  was  destined  to  be  the 
shelter  and  safe  nursery  of  Quakerism  in  the  days  of  its 
early  stress  in  the  New  World,  and  we  must  now  briefly 
study  the  new,  strange  colony  which  owed  its  birth  to 
the  "  Antinomian  "  turmoil  in  Massachusetts  Bay.1  The 
new  colony  was  founded  by  persons  who  were  either 
banished  for  taking  a  sympathetic  part  in  the  Hutchin 
son  controversy,  or  who  revolted  against  the  heavy  hand 
of  authority  in  Massachusetts  Bay.2  Winthrop  says : 
"  At  this  time  the  good  providence  of  God  so  disposed 
that  divers  of  the  congregation,  being  the  chief  men  of 
the  Antinomian  party,  were  gone  to  Narragansett  to 
seek  out  a  new  place  for  plantation." 3  The  fact  was 
that  the  Court  which  banished  Wheelwright  and  con 
demned  Anne  Hutchinson,  also  dealt  vigorously  with 
the  citizens  of  Boston  who  had  signed  the  petition  in 

1  There  were  doubtless  many  things  involved    in  this  famous  controversy. 
The  subtle  political  issues  between  the  party  of  Winthrop  and  the  party  of  Vane 
I  have  not  touched  upon.     The  lukewarmness  of  the  citizens  of  Boston,  when 
the  colony  was  girding  itself  for  the  Pequot  war,  was  supposed  by  Winthrop  and 
others  to  be  due  to  the  prevalence  of  the  "  new  opinions  "  in  religion.      But  it  is 
clear,  nevertheless,  that  the  central  trouble  lay  in  these  two  points  :  The  leaders  of 
the  new  party  had  boldly  criticised  the  ministers  of  the  colony  for  being  legal 
and  not  spiritual  ;  and  secondly,  they  had  insisted  on  the  fact  of  present  revelation 
as  against  the  view  that  God's  Word  is  found  only  in  a  Book.      It  was  for  these 
heresies  that  Wheelwright  was  forced   to  wander   through  the  snow  to  Exeter, 
and  it  was  for  these  heresies  that  Anne  Hutchinson  was  flung  out  of  the  colony  as 
a  leper.     These   exiles   had    thus  already  struck   the  central  issues  which   the 
Quakers  forced  to  the  front  a  score  of  years  later. 

2  The     Rhode  Island    Colony    must    be    carefully    distinguished    from    the 
Providence     Colony,     founded    by    Roger    Williams,    also    an    exile    from    the 
Massachusetts    Colony.       Roger   Williams    has    the    honour   of   being    one    of 
the  brave  path-breakers  toward  the  light,  and  he  was  undoubtedly  the  first  in 
the  New  World  to  annunciate  clearly  the  doctrine  of  soul-liberty.      I  have    no 
desire  to  detract  from  the  fame  which  properly  belongs  to  him,  but  it  is  a  plain 
fact  that  the  island  colony  in  the  southern  end  of  Narragansett  quickly   out 
stripped  in  importance  the  one  founded  at  Providence,  and  it  was  here  on  this 
island  of  Aquidneck  that  the  principle  of  spiritual  freedom  got  its  most  impressive 
exhibition  in  the  primitive  stage  of  American  history. 

3  Winthrop,  vol.  i.  p.  311. 


22     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  r 

favour  of  Wheelwright.  Twenty  of  the  signers  in  fear 
"  acknowledged  their  fault "  and  were  forgiven  ;  the  rest 
were  "  disarmed,"  in  which  list  were  a  number  of  the 
founders  of  the  little  colony  on  Aquidneck — the  persons 
"  disposed  by  the  providence  of  God  to  seek  out  a  new 
place  for  plantation."  1  The  little  party  sent  John  Clarke, 
with  two  companions,  on  ahead  to  locate  the  place  of 
settlement  and,  with  the  advice  and  assistance  of  Roger 
Williams,  with  whom  they  took  counsel,  they  decided 
upon  Pocasset  (now  Portsmouth),  on  the  island  then  called 
"Aquiday,"  now  called  "Rhode  Island."2  On  the 
7th  of  March  1638,  nineteen  members  of  the  new 
colony  signed  in  Providence  a  civil  compact  for  the 
incorporation  of  their  new  "  Body  Politick,"  and  they 
proceeded  to  elect  William  Coddington,  clearly  the  leader 
and  foremost  person  in  the  little  group,  their  Judge. 
The  simple  form  of  government,  which  was  here  initiated, 
was  slightly  modified  in  January  1639,  when  a  plan  was 
drafted  which  provided  for  "  three  elders "  to  assist  the 
Judge,  and  they  were  to  report  their  acts  every  quarter 
to  the  assembled  freemen  with  this  curious  arrangement 
for  veto  :  "  If  by  the  Body  [of  freemen]  or  any  of  them, 
the  Lord  shall  be  pleased  to  dispense  light  to  the 
contrary  of  what  by  the  Judge  and  Elders  hath  been 
determined  formerly,  that  then  and  there  it  shall  be 
repealed  as  the  act  of  the  Body." 3 

In  April  1639  tne  little  colonial  hive  at  Pocasset 
"  swarmed  "  and  formed  a  new  town,  which  was  named 
Newport,  on  the  other  edge  of  the  island.4  At  first  it 
was  an  independent  settlement  under  a  separate  govern 
ment,  with  Coddington  for  "Judge,"  Nicholas  Easton, 
John  Coggeshall,  and  William  Brenton  as  "  Elders," 
while  the  settlement  at  Pocasset  chose  William  Hutchin- 

1  Of  the  "founders"  William  Aspinwall  was  banished,  John  Coggeshall  was 
disarmed  and  disfranchised,  William  Coddington  and  nine  others  were  given  leave 
to  depart  within  three  months,  and  were  afterwards  hurried  off. 

8  See  John  Clarke's  "  111  Newes  from  New  England,"  printed  in  4  Mass.  Hist. 
Soc.  Col.  ii.  The  name  was  changed  from  Aquidneck  to  Rhode  Island 
1 3th  March  1644. 

3  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  i.  p.  63. 

4  Nicholas  Easton  built  the  first  house  in  Newport.     (See  Narr.  Hist.  Reg. 
vol.  viii.  p.  240. ) 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  23 

son,  husband  of  Anne,  for  Judge.  The  two  settlements 
were  united  under  one  government  in  March  1640  with 
William  Coddington  of  Newport  as  Governor,  and 
William  Brenton  of  Pocasset  (at  this  time  changed  to 
Portsmouth)  as  Deputy-governor.  A  year  later,  namely 
in  May  1641,  the  assembled  citizens  unanimously  declared 
that  "  this  Body  Politick  is  a  Democracie  ;  that  is  to  say, 
it  is  in  the  Power  of  the  Body  of  Freemen,  orderly 
assembled,  or  the  major  part  of  them,  to  make  Just 
Lawes  by  which  they  will  be  regulated." l  Under  the 
same  date  this  memorable  act  was  passed  :  "  It  is  ordered 
that  none  bee  accounted  a  delinqtient  for  doctrine'' z  In 
November  of  the  same  year  it  was  decreed  that  the 
"  Law  of  the  last  Court,  made  concerning  Libertie  of 
Conscience  in  Point  of  Doctrine  be  perpetuated." 3  And 
this  colony,  in  the  face  of  severe  tests  and  difficulties, 
maintained  this  principle  in  practice.4 

In  1641  the  persons  who  composed  the  Newport 
settlement  seem  to  have  arranged  themselves  into  two 
religious  groups.  One  party,  with  Coddington,  Cogges- 
hall,  and  Nicholas  Easton  as  leaders,  formulated  views 
which  seem  extraordinarily  akin  to  those  later  held  by 
the  Society  of  Friends  ;  while  the  other  group,  led  by 
John  Clarke,  formed  a  Baptist  Church. 

It  is  extremely  difficult  now  to  get  the  facts  on  these 
important  points.  Winthrop  says,  under  date  of  1641  : 

"  Mrs.  Hutchinson  and  those  of  Aquiday  Island  broached  new 
heresies  every  year.  Divers  of  them  turned  professed  Ana 
baptist,3  and  would  not  wear  any  arms,6  and  denied  all 

1  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  i.  112. 

2  Ibid.  p.  113.  3  Ibid.  p.  118. 

4  Cotton  Mather  gives  this  account  of  freedom  of  faith  in  the  Rhode  Island 
Colony  :  "I  believe  there  never  was  held  such  a  variety  of  religions  together  on 
as  small  a  spot  of  ground  as  have  been  in  that  colony. "  "  If  a  man  had  lost 
his  religion  he  might  find  it  at  the  general  muster  of  the  opinionists. "  ' '  Rhode 
Island  hath  usually  been  the  Gerizzim  of  New  England."  —  Magnalia,  ii. 
520-521. 

*  The  term  "Anabaptist,"  used  in  such  an  account,  hardly  means  more  than 
that  the  person  was  a  dissenter  from  the  established  faith  and  held  strongly  for 
inward  experience  in  religion.  See  my  Studies  in  Mystical  Religion,  chapter  on 
"  The  Anabaptists  "  (London,  1909). 

6  Nicholas  Easton  was  fined  five  shillings  in  1639,  for  coming  to  meeting 
without  his  weapons. — Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  i.  95. 


24     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

magistracy  among  Christians,  and  maintained  that  there  were 
no  churches  since  those  founded  by  the  apostles  and  evangelists, 
nor  could  any  be,  nor  any  pastors  ordained,  nor  seals  adminis 
tered,  but  by  such,  and  that  the  church  was  to  want  these  all 
the  time  she  continued  in  the  wilderness,  as  yet  she  was." 1 

It  is  not  probable  from  what  we  know  that  any  of  the 
persons  prominent  in  this  "  spiritual  circle "  denied 
magistracy  or  were  opposed  to  settled  social  order.  It 
is  probable  that  they  did  insist  that  religion  must  be  an 
affair  of  experience  and  that  a  true  church  could  not  be 
established  or  maintained  by  persons  who  were  "out  of 
the  life  "  and  only  externally  religious.  The  real  situation 
comes  out  somewhat  clearer  in  another  passage  in 
Winthrop : 

"  Other  troubles  arose  in  the  island  of  Aquiday  by  reason 
of  one  Nicholas  Easton,  a  tanner,  a  man  very  bold,  though 
ignorant.2  He  using  to  teach  [i.e.  taking  upon  himself  to  teach] 
where  Mr.  Coddington  their  Governor  lived,  maintained  that 
man  hath  no  power  or  will  in  himself,  but  as  he  is  acted  [upon] 
by  God,  and  that  a  Christian  is  united  to  the  essence  of  God."3 

Winthrop  undertakes  to  show,  by  inference,  that  this 
view  of  Easton's  makes  God  the  author  of  sin,  and  has 
blasphemous  consequences.  But  Easton  did  not  push 
his  view  to  dangerous  lengths  and  apparently  held, 
exactly  what  Friends  later  held,  that  there  is  something 
of  God  in  man,  and  that  man  becomes  a  truly  "  spiritual 
being"  by  reason  of  this  Divine  connection.  Winthrop 
further  says  that  Mr.  Coddington,  Mr.  Coggeshall,  and  some 
others  joined  with  Nicholas  Easton,  "  while  Mr.  Clark 
[John  Clarke],  Mr.  Lenthall  and  some  others  dissented, 
and  publicly  opposed,  whereby  it  grew  to  such  heat  of 
contention  that  it  made  a  schism."  4  There  was,  it  plainly 
appears,  thus  differentiated  here  in  Newport,  fifteen  years 

1  Winthrop,   ii.   46.       Winthrop   is    here    giving    a    description   of  what    is 
known  as  the  "  Seeker"  attitude  (see  Studies  in  Mystical  Religion).     It  is  likely 
that  some  of  the  group  in  Newport  insisted  that  only  spiritual  persons  can  perform 
spiritual  exercises.     There  is  no  evidence  that  they  went  further  than  this. 

2  This  is  an  instance  of  Winthrop's  unfairness   through   prejudice.     Easton 
was  a  man  of  high  standing  and  excellent  mental  parts.      He  was  three  times 
President  of  the  Colony,  six  times  Deputy-Governor,  and  three  times  Governor. 

8  Winthrop,  ii.  48.  4  Winthrop,  ii.  49. 


CH.  i  A  PRE-QUAKER  MOVEMENT  25 

before  the  coming  of  the  Quakers,  a  group  of  persons 
who  were  Quakers  in  everything  but  name.1 

Even  more  striking,  if  anything,  was  the  situation  in 
Portsmouth.  Letchford,  who  resided  in  New  England 
"almost  the  space  of  four  years"  prior  to  1641,  and  who 
spent  some  time  in  the  Colony  on  Rhode  Island,  says, 
after  commenting  on  the  state  of  religion  at  Newport : 

"  At  the  other  end  of  the  Island  there  is  another  town  called 
Portsmouth,  but  no  church  [i.e.  no  established  church] ;  there  is 
a  meeting  of  some  men  who  there  teach  one  another  and  call 
it  prophesie."  2 

This  looks  as  though  a  meeting  was  being  held  in  Ports 
mouth  at  this  date  in  which  the  members  spoke  as  they 
felt  "  moved  "  (for  that  is  what  "  in  the  way  of  prophesie  " 
means),  exactly  as  the  Quaker  meeting  was  held  a  little 
later.3 

1  It  should  be  remembered  that  this  was  at  least  six  years  before  George  Fox 
began  his  religious  activity  in  England. 

2  Letchford's  Plaine  Dealing  (Boston  reprint,  1868),  p.  94. 

8  We  shall  see  in  later  chapters  that  there  were  other  pre-Quaker  circles  in  the 
colonies  all  ready  to  be  merged  into  the  wider  Quaker  movement  as  soon  as  it 
made  itself  felt  on  these  shores.  The  "circles"  at  Salem  and  at  Sandwich, 
Mass.,  were  the  most  important  ones.  Mrs.  Hutchinson  did  not  live  long 
enough  to  hear  of  the  Quaker  movement,  for  the  spread  of  which  she  did  much  to 
prepare  the  way.  Her  husband,  William  Hutchinson,  died  in  1642,  and  soon 
after  she  moved  with  her  family  into  the  territory  of  the  Dutch,  settling  near 
Hell  Gate  in  West  Chester  Co. ,  New  York.  Here  in  the  autumn  of  1643  she  was 
murdered  by  Indians,  who  "slew  her,  and  her  family,  her  daughter  and  her 
daughter's  husband,  and  all  their  children,"  except  a  little  girl  who  was  carried 
into  captivity.  This  calamity  was  hailed  in  the  Puritan  Colony  as  a  "  Divine 
Judgment."  (See  Welde's  Rise,  Reign,  and  Ruin,  and  Mather's  Afagnalia.) 
Anne  Hutchinson's  sister,  Catharine  Scott,  and  her  family,  formed  the  nucleus  of 
the  original  group  of  Friends  in  Providence. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   QUAKERS    AT   THE    GATES 

THE  Quaker  message  had  first  been  heralded  in  London 
by  women,  and  the  first  attempt  to  win  over  the  Uni 
versities  of  England  to  the  "  truth,"  as  the  early  Quakers 
persistently  called  their  Gospel,  was  made  by  women.  So 
too,  the  first  Quakers  to  reach  the  American  hemisphere 
were  women,  who  in  deep  seriousness  regarded  themselves 
as  apostolic  messengers  under  divine  call  and  direction. 
They  were  Mary  Fisher  and  Ann  Austin.  Their  first 
place  of  landing  and  of  missionary  activity  was  the 
island  of  Barbadoes,  where  they  arrived  near  the  end  of 
the  year  1655.  The  island  of  Barbadoes  was,  during 
the  seventeenth  century,  the  great  port  of  entry  to  the 
colonies  in  the  western  world,  and  it  was  during  the  last 
half  of  that  century,  a  veritable  "hive"  of  Quakerism. 
Friends  wishing  to  reach  any  part  of  the  American  coast, 
sailed  most  frequently  for  Barbadoes  and  then  reshipped 
for  their  definite  locality.  They  generally  spent  some 
weeks,  or  months  even,  propagating  their  doctrines  in 
"  the  island  "  and  ordinarily  paying  visits  to  Jamaica  and 
often  to  Antigua,  Nevis,  and  Bermuda.  Large  Friends' 
meetings  rapidly  sprang  up  on  all  these  islands.  Barbadoes 
had  been  first  occupied  by  the  English  in  1605,  and  had 
submitted  to  the  authority  of  the  commonwealth  in  1652. 
Sugar-making  had,  as  early  as  1640,  become  its  great 
industry,  being  carried  on  by  negro  slaves  who  had  been 
brought  from  Africa,  and  the  island  enjoyed  unrestricted 
trade.  It  was  just  now  at  the  height  of  its  prosperity 
and  large  fortunes  were  being  made  there.  It  is  estimated 

26 


27 

that  there  were  25,000  inhabitants,  and  not  less  than 
10,000  slaves.  Of  the  inhabitants  Clarendon  said  they 
were  principally  men  "  who  had  retired  thither  only  to  be 
quiet  and  to  be  free  from  noise  and  oppressions  in 
England."  Among  these  quiet,  comfortable,  prosperous 
people,  the  two  "  publishers  of  the  truth "  as  we  have 
seen,  came  in  1655,  and  they  spent  about  six  months 
here  publishing  their  message. 

Mary  Fisher  was,  at  the  time  of  her  visit,  a  young, 
unmarried  woman  of  about  twenty-two  years  of  age, 
adorned  with  somewhat  uncommon  "  intellectual  faculties  " 
and  marked  by  "  gravity  of  deportment." 

She  had  been  a  servant  in  the  home  of  the  Tomlinsons 
of  Selby  in  Yorkshire,  and  had  been  "  convinced  "  of  the 
truth  of  the  Quaker  message  in  the  early  years  of  Fox's 
ministry,  and  went  forth  as  a  minister  herself  in  1652. 
The  first  two  years  of  her  ministry  were  mostly  spent 
in  York  Castle,  where  she  endured  two  terms  of  im 
prisonment,  one  of  sixteen  months  and  one  of  six. 
Between  these  two  imprisonments,  Mary  Fisher,  with  a 
woman  companion,  undertook  the  hazardous  mission  of 
carrying  the  Quaker  message  to  the  students  of  Cambridge 
University.  The  students  jeered  and  derided,  "with 
froth  and  levity."  The  mayor  of  the  city  ordered  the 
women  to  be  stripped  to  the  waist  and  "  whipped  at  the 
market  cross  till  the  blood  ran  down  their  bodies,"  a 
sentence  which  was  cruelly  executed,  while  the  women 
prayed  the  Lord  to  forgive  their  persecutors.1  Little  is 
known  of  the  life  of  Ann  Austin,  previous  to  her 
American  visit,  except  that  she  was  already  "stricken  in 
years,"  the  mother  of  five  children,  apparently  a  resident 
of  London,  and  plainly  enough  valiant  and  ready  for  the 
perils  of  her  dangerous  calling.  Their  work  in  Barbadoes 
seems  to  have  been  successful.  As  they  were  leaving 
the  island  for  their  hazardous  venture  in  New  England, 
Mary  Fisher  wrote  to  her  friends  in  England :  "  Here  is 
many  convinced  and  many  desire  to  know  the  way." 
On  their  return,  after  they  had  been  flung  out  of  Boston, 

1  Besse,  Sufferings  of  the  Quakers  (London  1753),  vol.  i.  p.  85. 


28      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES     BK.  i 

they  continued  the  work  in  Barbadoes,  and  had  their 
faith  and  zeal  well  rewarded.  Lieutenant-Colonel  Rous, 
a  wealthy  sugar-planter,  and  his  son  John  were  the  first 
to  identify  themselves  with  Friends  and  to  join  the 
movement.  They  were  in  fact  the  first  persons  in  the 
West  Indies  to  become  Quakers.  The  son,  John  Rous, 
came  forward  almost  immediately  in  the  ministry,  and 
before  the  year  was  out  had  issued  a  characteristic  Quaker 
tract :  "  A  Warning  to  the  inhabitants  who  live  in  pride, 
drunkenness,  etc.,  also  something  to  the  Rulers,  that  they 
rule  rightly  and  do  justice  on  the  wicked." * 

In  the  month  of  July  1656,  Master  Simon  Kempthorn, 
in  his  ship  Swallow,  sailing  from  Barbadoes,  brought 
those  two  women  into  Boston  harbour.  Governor 
Endicott  was  at  that  moment  absent  from  the  city,  and 
Deputy-governor  Richard  Bellingham  found  himself  con 
fronted  with  an  "  extraordinary  occasion."  He  seems  to 
have  been  equal  to  it.  He  ordered  the  women  to  be  kept 
on  the  ship  while  their  boxes  were  searched  for  books 
containing  "  corrupt,  heretical,  and  blasphemous  doctrines." 
One  hundred  such  books  were  found  in  their  possession. 
These  were  seized  and  burned  in  the  market-place  by 
the  common  hangman.2  This  being  done  the  women 
were  brought  to  land  and  committed  to  prison  on  the 
sole  charge  of  being  "  Quakers,"  deprived  of  light,  and  of 
all  writing  materials,  though  as  yet  no  law  had  made  it  a 
punishable  offence  to  be  a  Quaker.  A  fine  of  five  pounds 
was  laid  upon  any  one  who  should  speak  with  them,  and, 
to  make  assurance  doubly  sure,  their  prison  window  was 
closely  boarded  up.  They  were  furthermore  "  stripped 
stark  naked,"  and  searched  for  "tokens"  of  witchcraft 
upon  their  bodies.8  There  was  one  bright  spot  in  the 
dark  experience.  One  man  (who  was  evidently  Nicholas 
Upsall)  came  to  the  prison  and  offered  gladly  to  pay 

1  Letter   to  Margaret  Fell. — Swarthmore  Collection,  in   Devonshire   House, 
London,  i.  66. 

2  Snow,  in  his  History  of  Boston  (1825),  says  that  Nicholas  Upsall,  a  citizen 
of  Boston,  endeavoured  to  buy  these  Quaker  books. — Snow,  op.  cit.  p.  196. 

8  See  Bishop's  Mew  England  Judged  (London,  1703),  p.  12.  Henry  Fell, 
in  a  letter  to  M.  Fell,  gives  an  account  of  the  searching  of  these  women  as 
suspected  witches. — Swarthmore  Collection,  i.  66. 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  29 

the  fine  of  five  pounds  if  he  might  be  allowed  to  have 
conversation  with  the  Quaker  prisoners.1 

After  they  had  been  kept  five  weeks  in  confinement 
under  these  extraordinary  conditions,  the  master  of  the 
vessel  which  brought  them  was  put  under  a  bond  of  one 
hundred  pounds,  to  see  that  they  were  transported  to 
Barbadoes,  and  he  apparently  was  compelled  to  pay  the 
costs  of  their  transportation.2  The  Boston  jailer  had  to 
content  himself  with  their  bedding  and  their  Bibles  for 
his  prison  fees.  Governor  Endicott,  on  his  return, 
remarked  that  if  he  had  been  at  home  they  would  not 
have  got  away  without  a  whipping. 

George  Bishop,  whose  book  is  the  main  source  of  our 
information  on  the  details  of  the  New  England  "  invasion  " 
asks  of  the  magistrates  the  pertinent  question  :  "  Why 
was  it  that  the  coming  of  two  women  so  shook  ye,  as 
if  a  formidable  army  had  invaded  your  borders."8  The 
answer,  given  at  the  time,  was  a  string  of  vague  charges 
and  hysterical  epithets.  A  clearer  answer  can  perhaps 
be  given  at  this  distance  and  from  the  perspective  of 
historical  review. 

It  must  be  said  in  the  first  place  that  the  judgment  of 
the  officials,  and  particularly  of  the  ministers,  in  the 
Massachusetts  Colony  had  been  seriously  prejudiced  by 
rumours  and  accounts  that  had  preceded  the  arrival  of 
the  two  women.  Anti-Quaker  pamphlets  had  already 
come  from  the  press  in  great  numbers,  and  they  were 
unsparing  in  their  accounts  of  the  new  "  heresy."  Some 
of  these  pamphlets  were  written  by  ministers  who,  either 
before  or  after  the  publication  of  their  attack,  were 
settled  in  New  England  and  were  in  high  repute  there. 
Francis  Higginson,  the  author  of  A  Brief  Relation  of  the 
Irreligion  of  the  Northern  Quaker s>  published  in  1653, 
and  one  of  the  earliest  polemics  against  Friends,  was  a 
New  Englander.  Thomas  Welde,  who  had  been  a 

1  See  Henry  Fell's  letter  to  M.  Fell. — Swarthmore  Collection,  i.  66. 

a  The  master  of  the  vessel  which  took  them  to  Barbadoes  was  put  under  a 
bond  of  one  hundred  pounds  to  land  them  there  and  not  to  suffer  any  persons  i» 
the  Colony  to  speak  with  them  in  the  harbour  before  they  sailed. 

3  New  England  Judged,  p.  7. 


30     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

minister  in  high  favour  in  Massachusetts,  and  who  had 
taken  a  very  prominent  part  in  the  heresy  trials  and 
expulsion  of  Anne  Hutchinson  and  her  friends,  was  the 
principal  author  of  two  violent  anti-Quaker  Tracts,  The 
Perfect  Pharisee  under  Monkish  Holinesse,  and  A  further 
Discovery  of  that  Generation  of  Men  called  Quakers,  issued 
in  1653  and  1654.  Samuel  Eaton,  author  of  The 
Quakers  confuted,  published  in  1654,  was  brother  of 
Theophilus  Eaton,  a  governor  of  New  Haven,  and  had 
been  a  preacher  in  New  England.  Christopher  Marshall 
of  Woodkirk,  who  had  been  James  Nayler's  pastor,  and 
who  poured  forth  a  torrent  of  abuse  upon  George  Fox  and 
the  Quakers,  had  intimate  associations  with  Boston,  where 
he  had  been  a  member  of  John  Cotton's  Church,  and 
had  been  trained  in  the  ministry  by  that  famous  teacher.1 
The  writings  of  trusted  leaders  such  as  these  had  made 
Quakerism  an  accursed  thing  before  any  Quaker  crossed 
the  Atlantic.  The  Quakers  were  already  catalogued  as 
a  new  type  of  religious  Enthusiasts,  like  the  sect  which 
for  a  hundred  years  had  made  the  name  of  Miinster 
a  word  of  terror.2  In  fact  one  of  the  Massachusetts 
"  Declarations "  against  the  Quakers  traces  their  pedigree 
directly  to  these  fanatics  of  the  century  before : 

"  The  prudence  of  this  Court  was  exercised  in  making  provision 
to  secure  Peace  and  Order  against  their  Attempts,  whose  design 
(we  were  well-assured  by  our  own  experience  as  well  as  by  the 
example  of  their  Predecessors  in  Miinster)  was  to  undermine  and 
ruin  the  same."3 

The  allusion  to  Miinster  comes  out  also  in  a  Petition 
sent  in  1658  to  the  General  Court  for  severe  laws  against 
the  Quakers.  The  petitioners  say  : 

"Their  [the  Quakers]  incorrigibleness,  after  so  much  means 
used  both  for  their  conviction  and  for  preserving  this  place 


1  See  Transactions  of  the  Cong.  Hist.  Soc.,  March  1903,  p.  224.  For 
Marshall's  attacks  on  Fox,  see  Journal,  i.  107. 

8  A  fanatical  band  of  Anabaptists  captured  the  city  of  Miinster  in  1534,  and 
disturbed  the  world  with  their  strange  "  Kingdom." 

3  New  England  Judged,  p.  3. 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  31 

from  contagion,  being  such,  as  by  reason  of  their  malignant 
obduratices  [sic],  daily  increaseth  rather  than  abateth  our  fear  of 
the  spirit  of  Muncer  [Miinster],  or  John  of  Leyden  revived." l 

Nearly  all  the  Massachusetts  enactments  against  the 
Quakers  refer  not  only  to  their  "  horrid  opinions "  and 
"  diabolical  doctrines,"  but  also  to  their  dangerous  leaven 
of  "  mutiny,  sedition  and  rebellion,"  their  subtle  designs 
to  "  overthrow  the  order  established  in  Church  and 
commonwealth."  This  was,  as  we  in  this  calm  genera 
tion  know,  a  pure  figment  of  the  imagination,  but  it 
was,  nevertheless,  a  live  and  propulsive  idea  then  in 
the  minds  of  the  ministers  and  magistrates,  and  must 
be  reckoned  with  in  judging  their  treatment  of  the 
Quakers.2 

There  was  always  hanging  over  the  Puritan  colonists, 
another  terror,  to  us  very  pale  and  remote,  to  them  very 
real  and  imminent — the  terror  of  witchcraft ;  the  awful 
power  of  Satan  to  transform  a  human  person  into  a 
tool  of  malice  and  mischief.  Bellingham's  own  sister-in- 
law  had  been  executed  as  a  witch  only  a  few  months 
before  the  arrival  of  these  two  Quaker  women,  and  the 
eager  search  of  their  naked  bodies  for  "  tokens "  was 
very  significant ;  and  if  a  mark  or  blemish  had  been 
found  on  their  bodies,  something  besides  books  might 
have  burned  in  the  market-place. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  these  "  phobias,"  these 
unreasoned  and  morbid  delusions,  were  potent  factors  in 
predisposing  the  authorities  to  a  sternly  hostile  attitude 
toward  these  harmless  women  missionaries.  But  there 
was  a  deeper  and  solider  ground  for  their  hostile  attitude 
than  these  "obsessing  ideas"  furnish.  These  women 
were  the  bearers  of  a  type  of  religion  sharply  at  variance, 
and  in  fact  irreconcilable  with  that  already  established 
in  Massachusetts.  Feeble  as  they  were,  they  were  the 

1  Massachusetts  Archives,  vol.  x.  p.  246. 

*  This  hysterical  fear  of  "  designs  to  overthrow  the  established  order  "  was  a 
prominent  element  in  the  treatment  of  the  Hutchinson  party,  though  there  was 
not  the  slightest  ground  for  it.  Cotton  Mather,  even  after  overwhelming  evidence 
that  the  Quakers  had  no  designs  against  established  order,  still  in  his  day  called 
them  "dangerous  villains." — Magnolia,  vol.  ii.  p.  256. 


32      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

vanguard  of  an  army,  and  they  represented  a  new  spiritual 
empire  in  array  against  the  spiritual  empire  which  the 
Puritan  in  stern  consecration  was  building.  There  was 
no  delusion  in  the  statement  of  the  Court  that  "  the 
tenetts  and  practices  of  the  Quakers  are  opposite  to 
the  orthodoxe  received  opinions  and  practices  of  the 
godly"  i.e.  of  the  Massachusetts  ministers.1  We  must 
try  to  see  fairly  and  honestly  what  these  "  tenetts  and 
practices  "  were. 

The  central  truth  on  which  the  Quaker  of  that  period 
staked  his  faith  and  to  which  he  pledged  his  life,  was 
the  presence  of  a  Divine  Light  in  the  soul.  It  is  an 
important  historical  fact  that  every  Quaker  in  1656  held 
this  inward  Light  in  the  Soul  to  be  the  essential  truth  of 
religion.2  God,  they  said,  has  placed  a  Divine  principle — 
something  of  Himself — in  every  man.  This  Light  within 
condemns  every  step  toward  sin  and  evil,  it  approves 
every  act  of  rectitude  and  every  movement  in  the 
direction  of  righteousness.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  continuation 
now  in  many  lives  of  that  Christ,  that  Word  of  God  and 
Light  of  the  World  and  incorruptible  Seed  of  God  that 
was  incarnate  in  One  Life  in  Galilee  and  Judea.3  As 
fast  and  as  far,  they  said,  as  any  one  obeys  this  Light 
it  leads  him  into  all  truth  and  into  perfection  of  life, 
"  sets  him  atop  of  the  devil  and  all  his  works."  "  In  this 
Eternal  Life  and  Power,"  they  said,  "you  continually 
grow  up  in  the  Life  of  God — the  life  that  never  dies." 4 
Salvation  was,  thus,  for  them  not  a  transaction  but  a 
transformation  :  not  a  forensic  escape  from  the  penalty 
due  for  their  sins,  but  an  actual  deliverance  from  sin 

1  Proceedings  of  the  General  Court  held  in  Boston  igth  of  October  1658. 

3  Cotton  Mather  says  with  much  revulsion  :  ' '  They  call  men  to  attend  to 
the  mystical  dispensation  of  a  Light  within,  as  having  the  whole  of  religion 
contained  therein." — Magnalia,  vol.  ii.  p.  523. 

Neal  in  similar  vein  says  :  "The  Light  within  they  affirmed  to  be  sufficient 
to  salvation  without  anything  else." — Hist,  of  New  England,  vol.  i.  p.  322. 

3  ' '  This  Seed  and  Birth  of  God  in  us  is  a  living    Principle  ;  yea,  it  is  a 
measure  of  the  same  Life  and  Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ." — From  George  Keith's 
Immediate  Revelation,  p.  248. 

"The  Quakers  believe  both  in  a  Christ  without  and  a  Christ  within,  but 
not  as  two  Christs,  but  one  and  the  same  without  as  within." — John  Whiting, 
The  Sword  of  the  Lord  Drawn,  p.  5. 

4  Edward  Burrough,  Works  (1672)  p.  75. 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  33 

itself.  "  To  witness  [i.e.  experience]  God  within  you, 
the  Immanuel,  the  Saviour,  God-with-you,  is  the  whole 
salvation,  there  is  no  other  to  be  expected  than  this.  To 
witness  that  God  dwells  in  us  and  walks  in  us  is  to  be 
begotten  by  the  Word  of  God,  to  be  born  of  the 
Immortal  Seed  and  to  be  a  New  Creature."  x  Not  only 
did  they  insist  that  they  possessed  within  themselves  a 
Principle  of  moral  illumination,  a  Power  at  war  with  sin 
in  them,  an  Immanuel-God  working  in  them  to  free 
them  from  all  sin  and  to  raise  them  to  immortal  life,  but 
they  claimed  still  further  that  they  were  the  recipients  of 
direct  revelations. 

"  I  have  had,"  said  Fox,  "  a  word  from  the  Lord  as 
the  prophets  and  apostles  had."  They  were  simple, 
humble  men  and  women,  quite  devoid  of  cheap  ambitions, 
and  singularly  free  from  vain  desire  to  gain  mastery  over 
their  fellows  by  bold  assumptions  ;  but  they  believed,  with 
a  conviction  which  no  torture  could  shake,  that  the 
infinite  God  revealed  His  will  in  their  souls.  They  held 
it  for  certain  that  they  moved  under  orders  from  above, 
and  that  even  in  matters  of  seemingly  slight  importance 
they  were  guided  as  by  a  heavenly  vision.  One  of  the 
men  who  was  called  to  pass  through  the  martyr-baptism 
on  Boston  Common  has  left  this  simple,  straightforward 
account  of  his  "  call  "  : 

"In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1655,  I  was  at  the  plough  in 
the  east  part  of  Yorkshire  in  Old  England,  near  the  place  where 
my  outward  being  began,  and  as  I  walked  after  the  plough,  I 
was  filled  with  the  Love  and  the  presence  of  the  Living  God 
which  did  ravish  my  heart  when  I  felt  it ;  for  it  did  increase  and 
abound  in  me  like  a  living  stream,  and  the  Love  and  Life  of 
God  ran  through  me  like  precious  ointment  giving  a  pleasant 
smell,  which  made  me  stand  still ;  and  as  I  stood  a  little  still, 
with  my  heart  and  mind  stayed  on  the  Lord,  the  Word  of  the 
Lord  came  to  me  in  a  still  small  voice,  which  I  did  hear 
perfectly,  saying  to  me,  in  the  secret  of  my  heart  and  conscience, 
'  I  have  ordained  thee  a  prophet  unto  the  Nations.' "  2 

1  Burrough,  A  General  Epistle  to  the  Saints. 

2  From  a  letter  of  Marmaduke  Stephenson  written  from  Boston  Prison. — New 
England  Judged,  pp.  131-133. 

D 


34     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

Similar  accounts  of  experiences,  believed  to  be  "  open 
ings  "  of  call  and  guidance,  could  be  given  from  almost 
every  Quaker  pamphlet  of  that  period,  and  there  can 
be  no  question  that  the  leading  Friends  of  that  date  felt 
themselves  to  belong  to  the  order  of  prophets  and 
apostles.1  This  faith  and  expectation  created  the  peculiar 
type  of  meeting,  known  as  "  the  meeting  for  worship," 
which  was  one  of  the  most  unique  features  of  the 
Quakerism  that  was  now  knocking  for  admission  at 
the  port  of  Boston.  The  members  sat  down  in  silence, 
with  no  ordained  minister,  with  no  prearrangements,  no 
preparation  for  vocal  service  of  any  sort.  They  believed 
that  sensitive  souls  could  become  aware  of  celestial 
currents,  and  that  no  words  should  be  spoken  in  prayer 
or  ministry  until  the  lips  were  divinely  moved.  It  was  a 
bold  experiment,  an  attempt  to  realise  the  prophetic  ideal 
of  Jeremiah  that  there  should  be  a  new  Israel,  with  God's 
law  in  their  inward  parts,  and  with  His  will  written  in 
their  hearts.2  It  meant  nothing  less  than  the  claim  that 
revelation  is  continuous,  and  that  by  the  work  of  the 
Divine  Spirit  there  is  a  true  apostolic  succession. 

Another  bold  feature  of  this  new  religion  was  the 
absence  of  all  sacraments.  The  sacraments  are  "  shadows," 
they  said  ;  Christ  came  to  bring  men  to  realities,  and  they 
were  satisfied  that  they  had  found  the  realities.  "  The 
Spirit  of  God  changes  the  ground  {i.e.  nature]  of  the 
soul,  and  transmutes  it  into  His  own  nature,  while  all 
those  things  which  men  strive  so  much  about  are  but 
shadows." 3  "  There  is,"  says  another  of  their  leaders, 
"  a  spiritual  communion  which  reaches  beyond  all 

1  The  inference  which  their  opponents  drew  was  that  they  denied,  or  even 
discarded  the  Holy  Scriptures,  and  they  were  almost  invariably  ' '  examined  "  on 
this  point.     As  a  matter  of  fact,  they  never  denied  or  discarded  the  Scriptures  ; 
they  simply  denied  that  they  were  the  only  Rule  of  faith  and  practice  ;  since, 
they  insisted,  the  Light  of  Christ  in  the  heart  in  conjunction  with  the  Scriptures 
is  most  certainly  a  guide  and  rule.     They  were  also  supposed  to  be  very  unsound 
on  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,   and  they  were  frequently   ' '  tested "  on   this 
article  of  faith.    They  generally  gave  this  discreet  if  somewhat  inconclusive  answer  : 
"The  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit  we  own  [i.e.  believe  in],  but  a  Trinity  of 
Persons  the  Scriptures  speak  not  of  !  "     See  Humphrey  Norton's  Ensign,  p.  8. 

2  Jer.  xxxi.  33-34. 

3  Francis  Howgil,  Works  (1676),  p.  53. 


CH.  n        THE   QUAKERS  AT  THE   GATES  35 

visibles  and  is  above  all  mortal  and  fading  things." 
"  The  Lord,"  is  the  mighty  claim  of  still  another,  "  hath 
brought  me  into  a  life  which  I  live  by  the  springing  up 
of  life  within  me." 

It  was,  thus,  a  religion  of  first-hand  experience,  based 
primarily  not  on  historical  happenings  but  on  inward 
events.  Its  messengers  declared  that  they  had  found  the 
perennial  springs  of  Life,  and  they  claimed  that  these 
springs  were  bubbling  within  their  own  souls.  In  the 
power  and  joy  of  this  "  inward  bubbling,"  the  Quaker  felt 
a  certainty  of  his  election  which  the  Puritan  did  not  have. 
"  As  I  was  walking  in  the  fields,"  says  Fox,  "  the  Lord 
said  unto  me,  '  Thy  name  is  written  in  the  Lamb's  book 
of  life,'  and  as  the  Lord  spoke  it  I  believed." l  "  The 
Lord  said  unto  me,"  writes  William  Robinson  just  before 
his  execution  in  Boston,  " '  thy  soul  shall  rest  in  ever 
lasting  peace  and  thy  life  shall  enter  into  rest.'  " 2  This 
note  of  certainty  rings  through  all  the  writings  of  the 
first  Friends.  "  We  are  raised  from  the  dead,  we  are 
born  of  the  Immortal  Seed,  and  we  have  entered  into 
God's  Eternal  Life — the  Life  that  never  dies,"  is  the 
constantly  recurring  testimony.  John  Fiske,  who  more 
than  any  other  historian  of  Colonial  America  has 
succeeded  in  understanding  the  Quaker  position,  very 
truly  says  : 

"  The  ideal  of  the  Quakers  was  flatly  antagonistic  to  that 
of  the  settlers  of  Massachusetts.  The  Christianity  of  the 
former  was  freed  from  Judaism  as  far  as  was  possible ;  the 
Christianity  of  the  latter  was  heavily  encumbered  with  Judaism. 
The  Quaker  aimed  at  complete  separation  between  Church  and 
State;  the  government  of  Massachusetts  was  patterned  after 
the  ancient  Jewish  theocracy  in  which  church  and  state  were 
identified.  The  Quaker  was  tolerant  of  differences  in  doctrine ; 
the  Calvinist  regarded  such  tolerance  as  a  deadly  sin.  For 
these  reasons  the  arrival  of  a  few  Quakers  in  Boston  in  1656 
was  considered  an  act  of  invasion  and  treated  as  such."  3 

Even  more  obnoxious  to  the  Puritan,  certainly  to  the 

1  Journal,  voL  i.  p.  35. 

2  Letter  fromWm.  Robinson  written  in  Boston  Prison  igthof  8th  month  1659. 

3  Fiske,  Dutch  and  Quaker  Colonies,  vol.  ii.  p.  112. 


36     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

Puritan  divines,  than  their  ideals  or  than  their  theology 
was  the  Quakers'  estimate  of  official  ministers.  They 
could  be  as  tender  as  a  woman  toward  any  types  of  men 
who  were  low  down,  hard  pressed  and  sore  bestead,  but 
they  were  relentless  against  what  they  called  "  hireling 
ministry."  They  used  very  vivid  phrases  to  describe 
it,  and  they  were  as  intolerant  of  it  as  the  writer  of 
Deuteronomy  had  been  of  the  idolatry  of  his  day.  They 
hewed  at  it  as  fiercely  as  Samuel  had  hewed  Agag. 

Quakerism  was,  one  sees,  a  type  of  religion  at  every 
point  in  sharp  contrast  with  that  which  the  Puritans 
had  established  in  the  Massachusetts  Bay  Colony.  They 
were,  as  has  been  said,  two  different  spiritual  empires. 
The  leaders  were  incapable  of  understanding  each  other, 
and  there  was  foredoomed  to  be  a  clash  with  tragic 
consequences.  We  shall  dwell  as  little  as  possible  on 
the  tragedy,  and  we  shall  endeavour  to  understand  the 
attitude  of  the  persecutors  as  well  as  undertake  to  bring 
to  clear  light  in  these  pages  the  mission  of  the  Quakers 
in  the  New  World  and  the  type  of  their  religion. 

Two  days  after  Ann  Austin  and  Mary  Fisher, 
without  bedding  and  without  Bibles,  sailed  out  of  Boston 
harbour,  that  is,  August  7th,  1656,  a  ship  carrying  eight 
Quakers — "  pretty  hearts,  the  blessing  of  the  Lord  with 
them  and  His  dread  going  before  them " l — sailed  in. 
They  were  Christopher  Holder,  a  valiant  apostle  of  New 
England  Quakerism,  John  Copeland,  Thomas  Thurston, 
William  Brend,  Mary  Prince,  Sarah  Gibbons,  Mary 
Wetherhead,  and  Dorothy  Waugh.  With  them  also 
came  from  Long  Island  a  man  by  the  name  of  Richard 
Smith,  of  whom  we  shall  hear  later.  Officers  of  the 
Commonwealth  were  sent  on  board  the  ship  to  search 
their  boxes  for  "  erroneous  books  and  hellish  pamphlets," 2 

1  Letter  of  Francis  Howgil  in  Caton  Collection  of  MSS. 

2  Humphrey  Norton's  New  England's  Ensign,  p.  8.     The  title-page  of  New 
England s  Ensign  reads  :    It  being  the  account  of  Cruelty,  the  professor's  pride 
and  the  articles  of  their  faith  signified  in  characters  written  in  blood,  etc.     This 
being  an  account  of  the  sufferings  sustained  by  us  in  New  England  (with  the 
Dutch)  the  most  part  of  it  in  these  two  last  years  1657,  1658.     Written  at  sea 
by  us  whom  the  wicked  in  scorn  call  Quakers  in  the  second  month  of  the  year 
1659.     London,  1659. 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  37 

and  the  Friends,  after  the  examination  of  their  views  on 
the  Divine  Nature  and  the  Scriptures,  were  lodged  in  the 
prison  vacated  two  days  before — a  prison  which,  Bishop 
says,  addressing  the  magistrates  in  1660,  "ye  have 
supplied  with  the  bodies  of  the  saints  and  servants  of 
Jesus,  for  the  most  part  ever  since :  scarce  one  taken  out, 
but  some  one  or  other  put  into  his  room." l 

The  examination  above  referred  to  gave  the  prisoners 
their  one  chance  of  delivering  the  message  for  which  they 
had  come,  though  the  soil  on  which  the  seed  fell  was  not 
likely  to  be  of  a  very  receptive  sort.  One  of  the  Boston 
ministers  (Humphrey  Norton  says  it  was  John  Norton) 
during  the  examination  quoted  the  passage  from  2  Peter, 
"  we  have  a  more  sure  word  of  prophecy," 2  to  prove  that 
the  Scriptures  are  the  only  rule  of  faith  and  sole  guide  of 
life.  This  was  the  Quaker's  master-text  and  the  prisoners 
at  once  accepted  the  challenge.  They  forced  the  minister 
to  admit  that  the  passage  referred  to  the  Word  of  God 
manifested  within  the  soul  when  the  spiritual  day  dawn 
has  come  and  the  Day  Star  has  risen  in  the  heart. 
"  Where  is  the  '  dark  place '  of  which  the  text  speaks  ?  " 
John  Norton  asked  William  Brend.  "  It  is  under  my 
hand,"  answered  the  old  Friend,  with  his  hand  on  his 
breast.  The  Friends  then  turned  questioners  and  asked 
John  Norton  whether  the  Eternal  Word  was  a  suffi 
cient  rule  and  guide  or  not.  He  said  "  Yea."  He  was 
then  asked  whether  it  was  his  rule  and  guide.  He 
replied  that  it  was  when  he  was  rightly  guided.  The 
magistrates  then  cried  out  to  know  what  was  the 
difference  between  him  and  the  Quakers !  As  the 
examination  came  to  an  end  Governor  Endicott,  now 
home  from  his  journey,  made  the  significant  remark : 
"  Take  care  that  you  do  not  break  our  ecclesiastical  laws, 
for  then  you  are  sure  to  stretch  by  a  halter."  8 

They  were  kept  for  eleven  weeks  in  close  confinement, 
deprived  of  all  material  comforts,  and  frequently  examined 
by  the  ministers  of  the  Colony.  At  the  end  of  this  period 

1  New  England  Judged,  p.  41.  8  2  Peter  i.  19. 

8  Ensign,  p.  9;  New  England  Judged,  p.  10. 


38      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

the  master  of  their  vessel,  though  somewhat  recalcitrant, 
and  citing  his  rights  as  a  citizen  to  convey  freeborn 
Englishmen  whithersoever  he  would,  was  compelled  under 
a  bond  of  £500  to  transport  the  eight  Quakers  back  to 
the  mother  country.  One  of  the  most  interesting  episodes 
of  their  imprisonment  was  the  correspondence  carried  on 
between  them  and  Samuel  Gorton  of  Warwick,  Rhode 
Island.  He  himself  had  endeavoured  to  expound  a 
mystical  religion,  and  had  suffered  much  for  his 
doctrines.  He  had  been  banished  from  Massachusetts 
and  had  founded  a  tiny  colony  at  Warwick,  under  the 
patronage  of  the  Earl  of  Warwick,  where  he  and  his 
followers  found  peace,  and  he  seems  to  have  conceived 
the  idea  of  opening  his  colony  as  a  base  of  activity  for 
the  Quakers.  His  first  letter  is  dated  i6th  September 
1656,  and  is  addressed  "To  the  Strangers  and  out-casts, 
with  respect  to  carnall  Israel,  now  in  prison  at  Boston, 
for  the  name  of  Christ."  He  writes  : 

"The  report  of  your  demeanour  ....  as  also  the  errand 
you  come  upon  hath  much  taken  my  heart,  so  that  I  cannot 
withhold  my  hand  from  expressing  its  desires  after  you.  That 
present  habitation  of  yours  ourselves  have  had  a  proof  of  from 
like  grounds  and  reasons  that  have  possessed  you  thereof,  unto 
which  in  some  measure  we  still  remain  in  point  of  banishment 
under  pain  of  death,  out  of  these  parts.  .  .  .  No  doubt  but 
the  bolts  will  fly  back  in  the  best  season,  both  in  regard  of  your 
selves  and  us." 

Then  after  some  odd  and  peculiar  advice  to  them,  and 
comments  upon  his  own  buried  condition  "  in  a  corner  of 
the  earth  grudged  even  as  burying-place,"  he  adds  : 

"  But  our  God  may  please  to  send  some  of  his  Saints  unto  us 
to  speak  words  which  the  dead  hearing  them  shall  live.  I  may 
not  trouble  you  further  at  this  time,  onely  if  we  knew  that  you 
have  a  mind  to  stay  in  these  parts  after  your  enlargement  (for 
we  hear  that  you  are  to  be  sent  back  to  England)  and  what 
time  the  ship  would  saile,  or  could  have  hope  the  Master  would 
deliver  you,  we  would  endeavour  to  have  a  Vessell  in  readinesse, 
when  the  Ship  goeth  out  of  harbour,  to  take  you  in,  and  set  you 
where  you  may  enjoy  your  liberty."  .  .  .  "In  Spirit  cleave  unto 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  39 

Him  (as  being  in  you)  who  is  ever  the  same  all  sufficient:  In 
whom  I  am  yours,  Samuel  Gorton."1 

The  Friends  wrote  a  long  and  appreciative  answer  to 
this  friendly  letter,  beginning  with  the  salutation  :  "  In 
that  Measure  [of  Light]  which  we  have  received,  which  is 
eternall,  we  see  thee  and  behold  thee  and  have  onenesse 
with  thee."  They  then  declare  that  their  minds  are  set 
to  stay  in  Massachusetts — "we  are  unwilling  to  go  out 
of  these  parts,  if  here  we  could  be  suffered  to  stay,  but 
we  are  willing  to  mind  the  Lord,  and,"  they  add,  "  if  He 
in  His  wisdome  shall  raise  thee  up,  and  others  for  that  end, 
we  shall  be  willing  to  accept  it."2  They  were,  however, 
prevented  from  accepting  his  offer  because  the  captain 
was  under  bond  to  take  them  to  England,  and  to  land 
them  nowhere  else.  Richard  Smith,  a  little  later,  was 
sent  home  to  Long  Island  by  sea,  lest  by  any  chance  he 
might  spread  the  contagion  of  his  heresy,  if  he  were 
allowed  to  go  by  land. 

But  in  spite  of  all  these  precautions  to  keep  the 
commonwealth  immune,  there  were  positive  signs  of 
infection.  There  was  living  at  this  time  in  Boston 
an  honest,  independent -minded  man,  already  well  ad 
vanced  in  years,  named  Nicholas  Upsall.  He  was,  in 
the  language  of  the  time,  "  sober,  and  of  unblameable 
conversation,"  and,  though  diligent,  his  inward  longings 
for  the  refreshment  of  his  soul  were  unsatisfied.  He 
heard,  with  the  rest,  of  the  arrival  of  the  two  Quaker 
women,  and  he  tried  to  save  the  hundred  books  which 
were  doomed  to  go  up  in  smoke,  but  the  report  of  their 
doctrines  interested  and  impressed  him  rather  than  dis 
turbed  him.  He  heard  that  the  women  were  being 
starved  in  the  prison,  and  he  resolved  that  they  should  be 
fed.  By  the  payment  of  five  shillings  a  week,  he  induced 
the  jailer  to  let  him  feed  them  and  throughout  their 
imprisonment  they  ate  his  provisions.  As  events  pro- 

1  Gorton's  Antidote  Against  the  Common  Plague  of  the   World.     Printed  in 
Rhode  Island  Historical  Collection,  vol.  ii. 

2  Their  letter  is  also  printed  in  the  Antidote.     Gorton  also  wrote  a  second 
letter  in  which  he  notes  that  ' '  God  hath  frustrated  our  desired  design  we  doubt 
not  but  for  the  best." 


40     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN   COLONIES     BK.  i 

gressed  he  was  carried  on  with  them  farther  than  he  had 
expected.  While  the  eight  Quakers  were  in  prison,  the 
General  Court  of  Massachusetts,  with  the  sanction  of  the 
"  Commissioners  of  the  United  Provinces,"  passed  their 
first  law  against  the  Quakers — "  a  cursed  sect  of  heretics 
who  take  upon  themselves  to  be  immediately  sent  of 
God,  and  infallibly  assisted  by  the  Spirit." l  The  law 
enacted  a  fine  of  .£100  upon  any  master  of  a  sailing  craft 
who  should  bring  a  Quaker  to  the  Colony,  and  a  fine  of 
£5  upon  any  one  who  should  bring  into  the  jurisdiction 
any  Quaker  book,  or  conceal  one  in  his  house.2  It  was 
further  enacted  that  if  by  any  means  a  Quaker  should 
make  his  way  into  the  Colony,  he  should  be  arrested, 
whipped,  committed  to  the  house  of  correction,  kept  con 
stantly  at  work,  and  prevented  from  having  conversation 
with  any  one  until  he  was  once  more  out  of  the  jurisdiction. 
While  this  law  was  being  proclaimed  through  the 
streets  of  Boston,  preceded  by  beat  of  drum,  the  old  man 
Nicholas  Upsall,  standing  in  front  of  his  own  door, 
raised  his  voice  in  protest.  He  was  brought  before  the 
court,  and  here,  "  in  tenderness  and  love,"  he  solemnly 
warned  the  magistrates  against  the  course  they  were 
pursuing.  He  was  fined  £20  and  banished  from 
the  Colony,  spending  the  winter  of  1656  in  Sandwich 
in  the  Plymouth  Colony,  and  making  his  way  in  the 
spring  to  that  haven  of  rest  for  persecuted  Christians,  the 
island  of  Rhode  Island,  where  he  received  a  kindly 
welcome  from  the  citizens  of  the  Aquidneck  Colony.8  His 
tale  of  hardship  won  the  hearts  of  the  Indians,  who  were 
unsophisticated  in  theology.  One  of  the  chiefs  called 
him  "  friend,"  and  offered  to  build  him  a  comfortable 
house,  if  he  could  accept  his  hospitality,  commenting  with 
instinctive  insight  on  the  old  man's  persecutors  :  "  What  a 
God  have  the  English  who  deal  so  with  one  another  over 
the  worship  of  their  God." 4 

1  Colony  Records  of  Massachusetts,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  277. 

a  Ibid.  p.  308. 

*  The  Order  fining  Nicholas  Upsall  "for  reproaching  the  honoured  magis 
trates,  and  speaking  against  the  law  made  and  published  against  the  Quakers," 
is  in  Colony  Records  of  Massachusetts,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  279. 

4  The  Ensign,  p.  14. 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  41 

Nicholas  Upsall  became  fully  convinced,  and  accepted 
the  truth  which  the  Quakers  taught.  He  is  thus  the  first 
fruit  of  the  planting  in  New  England,  the  first  citizen  of 
Massachusetts  to  join  his  lot  with  the  Quakers. 

The  knocking  at  the  gates  had  thus  begun  ;  the  next 
year,  1657,  was  to  witness  something  like  an  incipient 
"  invasion." 

We  must  now  return  for  a  brief  examination  of  the 
progress  of  the  work  in  the  West  Indies ;  for  the  de 
velopment  of  Quakerism  there  is  bound  up  essentially 
with  the  spread  of  the  new  faith  on  the  American 
continent.  George  Rofe,  an  important  Quaker  traveller, 
writing  from  Barbadoes  as  early  as  1661  calls  this  island 
"  the  nursery  of  the  truth." l  So  in  fact  it  was,  for  it 
sent  a  small  army  of  missionaries,  strange  as  it  sounds 
to-day,  to  Massachusetts,  and  one  of  the  Boston  martyrs, 
William  Leddra,  came  from  this  "nursery  of  truth." 
Besse  gives  a  list  of  two  hundred  and  sixty  Friends  who 
suffered  persecution  in  Barbadoes.2 

Henry  Fell,  of  Furness,  reached  Barbadoes  in  October 
1656,  and  he  gives  a  graphic  account  of  the  situation  as 
he  found  it  "  Truly  Mary  Fisher  is  a  precious  heart, 
and  hath  been  very  serviceable  here,  so  likewise  hath 
John  Rous  and  Peter  Head,  and  the  Lord  hath  given  a 
blessing  to  their  labours,  for  the  fruits  thereof  appear,  for 
here  is  a  pretty  many  people  convinced  of  the  truth, 
among  whom  the  Lord  is  placing  His  name.  They  meet 
together  in  silence  in  three  several  places  in  the  island." 
Fell  at  once  threw  himself  into  the  service,  and  crossed 
controversial  swords  with  Joseph  Salmon,8  a  leading 
Ranter,  already  known  to  George  Fox.  Fell  says  that 
he  had  never  met  any  one  who  had  the  form  of  truth  in 
words  so  well  as  Salmon  :  he  got  away  with  the  great 
people  who  protected  him  whenever  the  Quaker  began 
questioning  him,  and  many  were  so  bewitched  with 
him  that  they  would  hear  nothing  against  him.  The 

1  Letter  in  the  Stephen  Crisp  Collection,  Devonshire  House,  No.  102. 

2  Besse's  Sufferings,  vol.  ii.  pp.  278-351. 

3  For  Salmon,  see  my  Studies  in  Mystical  Religion,  pp.  472,  475-477. 


42      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

Governor,  a  great  friend  of  Lieutenant-Colonel  Rous,  was 
moderate  towards  Friends.  He  took  no  offence  at  John 
Rous's  "  warning,"  or  at  Henry  Fell's  hat  or  "  thouing " 
of  him  ;  as  for  Friends'  lives,  he  said  they  were  inoffensive 
and  unblameable,  but  their  judging  of  others  he  could  not 
bear.  William  Dewsbury,  one  of  the  foremost  of  the 
builders  of  Quakerism  in  England,  wrote  letters  both  to 
the  Governor  and  to  the  Lieutenant-Colonel,  a  circum 
stance  which  shows  the  close  interest  with  which  the 
growth  of  a  Quaker  community  in  Barbadoes  was  followed 
in  the  mother-country.  Fell  found  the  morals  of  the 
island  poor,  the  people  often  "  filthy,"  and  some  of  the 
ministers  notorious  drunkards.  He  tried  again  and  again 
to  speak  in  the  churches,  but  they  were  so  guarded  by 
the  "  rude  multitude,"  that  he  always  found  himself 
ejected  from  the  building  before  he  had  uttered  more 
than  a  few  words.  Many  were  convinced  and  came  to 
meetings,  but  it  was  hard  to  persuade  them  to  take  up 
the  cross  and  avow  themselves  Friends.  Four  or  five 
meetings  a  week  were  attended  by  Fell  and  Rous,  and 
convincement  followed.1 

Henry  Fell,  after  trying  in  vain  to  get  passage  to  New 
England,  for  the  master  of  the  ship  refused  to  carry  him, 
returned  to  England  in  the  autumn  of  1657,  reaching 
London  after  capture  by  the  Spaniards,  and  a  journey 
through  France  to  Rochelle,  but  only  to  return  a  little 
later  to  promote  the  work  in  Barbadoes.  John  Rous  was 
the  only  ministering  Friend  left  in  Barbadoes,  and  he  was 
eager  to  get  passage  for  New  England.  He  writes,  how 
ever,  "  here  are  some  precious  Friends,  which,  I  know,  if 
there  were  none  in  the  ministry  with  them,  will  stand 
witnesses  for  God  against  the  world  here." 2  But  a  few 
months  later,  Peter  Evans  of  Barbadoes  reported  that,  in 
the  absence  of  ministers,  coldness  had  got  in  and  there  was 
need  for  some  who  could  declare  the  testimony  of  truth 
with  authority.3  A  number  of  Friends,  including  Henry 

1  These  particulars  are  taken  from  an  important  series  of  Henry  Fell's  letters 
in  the  Swarthmore  Collection. 

2  To  Margaret  Fell,  2nd  July  1657,  Swarthmore  Collection,  i.  80. 

3  To  George  Fox,  28th  April  1658,  Swarthmore  Collection,  iii.  no. 


CH.  ii       THE  QUAKERS  AT  THE  GATES  43 

Fell,  were  in  the  island  the  following  year,  and  we  hear 
of  growing  meetings  and  many  convincements. 

Work  was  begun  in  several  other  of  the  West  Indian 
plantations  though  we  have  few  details.  Early  in  the 
year  1656  Mary  Fisher,  John  Rous,  and  Peter  Head  had 
paid  a  visit  to  the  island  of  Nevis  and  planted  the  seed 
there.  John  Bowron,  of  Cotherstone  in  Durham,  after 
carrying  the  Quaker  message  to  the  Orkneys,  embarked 
there  for  the  West  Indies,  and  in  the  years  1657  and 
1658  visited  Surinam,  then  an  English  plantation  under 
Lord  Willoughby.  There  he  travelled  for  several  hundreds 
of  miles  among  the  natives,  who  were  mostly  naked,  and 
he  was  listened  to  with  respect  as  "  a  good  man  come 
from  far  to  preach  the  white  man's  God." 

"  He  went  to  their  sort  of  worship,  which  was  performed  by 
beating  upon  holly-trees,  and  making  a  great  noise  with  skins, 
like  a  sort  of  drums,  and  he  declared  the  word  of  the  Lord 
among  them  by  an  interpreter  .  .  .  and  spake  to  their  kings, 
who  were  arrayed  with  fish-shells  hung  about  their  necks  and 
arms,  and  they  spake  to  him  in  their  language  and  confessed 
he  was  a  good  man  come  from  far  to  preach  the  white  man's 
God."  i 

This  was  the  earliest  piece  of  what  we  should  now 
call  Foreign  Missionary  work.  Two  Friends  visited 
Jamaica,  which  had  been  captured  from  the  Spaniards  in 
May  1655  by  Admiral  Pen n,  the  father  of  William  Penn. 
As  an  English  plantation  it  was  just  making  headway 
against  disease  and  the  Spaniards  when  its  capable  Acting- 
Governor,  Colonel  Edward  D'Oyley,  asked  advice  of 
Secretary  Thurloe  as  to  the  correct  treatment  of  Quakers. 
The  letter  is  a  charming  revelation  of  the  fair-minded 
but  perplexed  official  who  finds  the  real  Quaker  very 
different  from  the  portrait  drawn  in  malicious  public 
prints. 

"There  are  some  people,"  he  writes,2  "lately  come  hither 
called  Quakers,  who  have  brought  letters  of  credit  and  do 
disperse  books  amongst  us.  Now  my  education  and  judgment 

1  Piety  Promoted,  vol.  i.  p.  234. 

2  28th  Feb.  1657/8,  Thurloe  State  Papers,  vol.  vi.  p.  834. 


44     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

prompting  me  to  an  owning  of  all  that  pretend  any  way  to 
godliness  and  righteousness — whereof  these  people  have  a  very 
great  appearance — and  the  prints  telling  me  that  the  heads  of 
the  people  are  contriving  against  the  Government,  and  accounted 
conspirators  against  His  Highness  (so  the  book  calls  them),  hath 
put  me  to  some  stand  how  to  carry  myself  towards  them,  and 
numbly  to  seek  your  honour's  directions,  that  my  carriage  in 
being  tender  to  them,  who  are  people  of  an  unblameable  life, 
and  to  whose  acting  I  am  a  stranger,  may  not  procure  blame 
from  him  in  whose  service  I  am — being  desirous  to  steer  my 
course  to  the  interest  I  serve  and  to  appear  very  heartily  and 
clearly  His  Highness's  faithful  subject." 

In  1660  Richard  Finder,  of  Ravenstonedale  near 
Sedbergh,  and  George  Rofe,  of  Halstead,  carried  the 
Quaker  message  to  the  Bermudas.  They  were  received 
by  many  whose  expectation  was  towards  God,1  and  were 
soon  holding  three  or  four  meetings  a  week  to  the  great 
torment  of  the  priests.  A  public  dispute  with  the 
ministers  of  the  main  island  was  arranged  by  the  Governor, 
after  which  they  were  freely  tolerated  and  meetings 
increased  greatly  in  several  places.  Several  settled 
meetings  were  begun,  "  at  which  many  knew  where  to 
wait  to  receive  the  Lord's  secret  strength." 

The  growth  of  Quaker  communities  in  the  West 
Indian  plantations,  especially  in  Barbadoes,  was  followed 
with  keen  interest  by  English  Friends.  It  shows  the 
moral  alertness  of  Fox's  mind  that  as  early  as  the  year 
1657  he  addressed  an  epistle  "  to  Friends  beyond  sea  that 
have  Blacks  and  Indian  Slaves."  In  this  he  points  out 
that  God  hath  made  all  nations  of  one  blood  and  that  the 
gospel  is  preached  to  every  creature  under  heaven,  "  which 
is  the  power  that  giveth  liberty  and  freedom  and  is  glad 
tidings  to  every  captivated  creature  under  the  whole 
heavens."  And  so,  he  says,  "  ye  are  to  have  the  mind  of 
Christ  and  to  be  merciful,  as  your  heavenly  Father  is 
merciful."2  In  such  language  as  this  we  find  the  germs 
of  the  testimony  which  in  after  years  the  Society  of 
Friends  bore  on  the  subject  of  slavery. 

1  See  Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.  39,  containing  documents  from  Finder,  1710 
August  1660,  and  from  George  Rofe  somewhat  earlier. 

2  Fox,  Epistle  No.  153. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  FOUNDERS  OF  NEW  ENGLAND  QUAKERISM 

MANY  famous  ships  have  had  their  names  imperishably 
woven  into  the  story  of  the  American  colonies,  and  the 
coming  of  the  precious  human  freight  on  the  Mayflower, 
the  Arbella,  and  the  Welcome  has  profoundly  shaped  the 
current  of  western  civilisation.  But  of  all  the  ships 
which  brought  pioneer  founders  to  these  shores  none  ever 
brought  passengers  more  bravely  consecrated  to  the  ideals 
for  which  they  sailed,  and  none  has  left  a  stranger  narrative 
of  Divine  guidance,  than  the  ship  Woodhouse,  which 
brought  the  original  "  apostles "  of  Quakerism  to  New 
England.  The  captain's  "  log  "  is  declared  to  be — 

"  A  true  relation  of  the  voyage  undertaken  by  me  Robert 
Fowler,  with  my  small  vessel  called  the  Woodhouse,  but  performed 
by  the  Lord,  like  as  He  did  Noah's  Ark,  wherein  He  shut  up  a  few 
righteous  persons  and  landed  them  safe,  even  at  the  hill 
Ararat." l 

The  action  of  the  Massachusetts  authorities  against 
Quakers  had  made  shipmasters  wary  of  that  kind  of 
passengers.2  They  were  very  unprofitable  cargo.  It 
was  evident  that  they  must  have  a  ship  of  their  own 
if  they  were  to  carry  out  their  designs  in  the  New  World. 

1  There  is  a  manuscript  of  this  extraordinary  ship's  log,  endorsed  by  George 
Fox,  in  the  Devonshire  House  Library  in  London,  A.  R.B.  MSS.  i. 

1  Soon  after  the  banishment  of  the  eight  ministers,  recorded  in  the  last 
chapter,  a  ship  brought  Mary  Dyer  and  Ann  Burden  to  Boston,  both  of  whom 
had  become  convinced  of  Quakerism  in  England.  Mary  Dyer's  story  will  be 
told  later.  Ann  Burden  had  come  over  to  settle  up  the  estate  of  her  deceased 
husband,  who  had  been  a  citizen  of  Boston.  She,  however,  was  not  allowed 
to  remain  to  collect  her  debts,  and  the  master  of  the  ship  was  compelled  to  carry 
her  back.  He  was  given  the  privilege  of  seizing  a  sufficient  quantity  of  her 
goods  to  cover  his  charges,  but  he  nobly  declined  to  accept  such  an  offer. 

45 


46     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     «K.  i 

Go  they  must ;  for,  as  one  of  them  wrote,  "  the  Lord's 
word  was  as  a  fire  and  a  hammer  in  me,  though  in  the 
outward  appearance  there  was  no  likelihood  of  getting 
passage."  l  At  this  juncture  of  affairs,  Robert  Fowler  of 
Bridlington,  a  Quaker  convert  of  four  years'  standing, 
who  had  been  "  one  of  the  first  fruits  unto  God  in  the 
east  parts  of  Yorkshire,"  felt  it  laid  upon  him  to  build 
a  ship  "  in  the  cause  of  truth,"  and  as  he  was  building 
it,  "  New  England  was  presented  "  before  him.  He  was 
a  member  of  Holderness  Monthly  Meeting,  and  the 
ancient  minute  book  of  that  meeting  quaintly  says  that 
"  the  power  of  the  Lord  wrought  mightily  in  Robert 
Fowler,  and  others  who  gladly  received  the  word  of  life," 
and  it  continues  "  the  Lord  anointed  them  with  his  Spirit, 
and  that  led  them  into  truth  and  righteousness,  and  some 
were  fitted  to  labour  in  his  vineyard."  The  boat  which 
he  felt  himself  called  to  build  was  only  a  small  craft,  far 
too  small  for  ocean  service,  but  the  builder  was  deeply 
impressed  that  the  God  of  the  waters  could  guide  it,  as 
He  did  Noah's  Ark,  and  he  brought  it  up  to  London 
and  offered  it  for  the  hazardous  voyage.2  Eleven  Friends, 
"firmly  persuaded  of  the  Lord's  call"  to  New  England, 
were  eagerly  waiting  for  a  means  of  passage,  and  they 
thankfully  accepted  what  seemed  to  them  a  "  providential 
ship."  Six  of  them  were  of  the  former  party,  already 
expelled  from  Boston.3  These  were  Christopher  Holder, 
John  Copeland,  William  Brend,  Sarah  Gibbons,  Mary 
Wetherhead,  and  Dorothy  Waugh.  Christopher  Holder 
at  the  time  was  a  resident  of  Winterbourne  in  Gloucester- 

1  Letter   of   Henry  Fell   to  Margaret  Fell,   igth  of  February  1657,  in  the 
Swarthmore  Collection  i.  68. 

2  There  is  a  manuscript  in  the  Swarthmore  Collection  (i.  397)  which  contains 
the  following  items  of  "  Monies  Disbursed  for  the  Service  of  Truth." 

"To  New  England " — 

For  Provisions  for  voyage 


Paid  to  the  Master  for  part  of  his  freight 
For  bedding  and  other  things 
In  money  .... 
To  Wm.  Brend 

,,  M.  Wetherhead    . 

, ,  Sarah  Gibbons 


30     o     o 
12     8     o 

35  4  4 
i  10  8 
200 
4  10 


8  Thomas  Thurston,  who  was  of  the  former  party,  took  another  way  of 
reaching  Boston,  as  we  shall  see ;  Mary  Prince  found  another  field  of  service, 
no  less  romantic  and  no  less  hazardous,  in  the  East. 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  47 

shire,  "a  well-educated  man  of  good  estate,"  who  had 
already  been  well  tested  in  suffering  for  his  faith,  having 
passed  a  term  of  imprisonment  in  "ye  gayle  in  Ilchester." 
John  Copeland  was  also  well  educated,  and,  like  Holder, 
in  the  early  prime  of  life.  He  was  a  native  of  Holderness 
in  Yorkshire.  William  Brend  was,  in  the  language  of 
the  time,  "  an  ancient  and  venerable  man,"  "  known  to 
many  as  one  who  feared  God  in  his  generation."  He 
had  come  to  manhood  in  the  days  of  Queen  Elizabeth, 
but  was  still  of  an  iron  constitution  and  an  indomitable 
spirit.  Sarah  Gibbons  was  a  young  woman  whose  early 
history  is  obscure,  and  whose  years  of  service  were  cut 
short  by  the  untimely  sinking  of  a  canoe  in  which  she 
was  making  a  landing  at  Providence  in  1659 — "but," 
writes  one  of  her  friends,  "  she  was  kept  faithful  to  the 
end."  Mary  Wetherhead  was  a  young  woman  from 
Bristol,  who,  after  her  short  period  of  dangerous  service 
in  New  England,  was  shipwrecked  and  drowned  with  two 
of  her  companions,  Richard  Doudney  and  Mary  Clark. 
Dorothy  Waugh  had  been  a  serving-maid  in  the  family 
of  John  Camm  of  Preston  Patrick,  where  she  was  "  con 
vinced  and  called  to  the  work  of  ministry." l  During  the 
intervening  period  before  her  voyage  in  the  Woodhouse,  she 
had  been  in  many  jails  in  various  parts  of  England.  She 
was  not  as  well  equipped  intellectually  as  her  companions 
were,  and  she  was  apparently  not  over  judicious,2  but  she 
had  an  intensity  of  zeal  and  considerable  power  in  ministry. 
The  new  volunteers  were  William  Robinson,  Humphrey 
Norton,  Richard  Doudney,  Robert  Hodgson,  and  Mary 
Clark.  William  Robinson  was  a  London  merchant,  a 
young  man  of  education,  successful  in  his  affairs,  and 
possessed  of  a  fine  and  lofty  spirit,  ready  to  endure  to 
the  death  for  his  soul's  vision  of  truth.  Humphrey 
Norton  first  comes  into  notice  in  1655.  He  had,  before 
sailing  in  the  Woodhouse,  performed  an  extensive  service 
in  Ireland,  where  he  had  learned  how  to  suffer  severe 
persecution.  He  had,  too,  shown  his  fearless  spirit  in 

1  See  First  Publishers  of  Truth,  p.  255. 

2  Mary  Prince  writes  to  George  Fox,  "  I  was  ensnared  by  D.  Waugh,  but  I 
am  out  through  the  love  of  God." — Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.  58. 


48     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

the  proffer  of  himself  as  a  substitute  prisoner  to  take 
the  place  of  George  Fox  who  was  lying  in  Launceston. 
In  April  1656  he  wrote  to  Fox:  "The  want  of  thy 
showing  forth  unto  Israel  lies  now  upon  me,"  and  he 
declares  that  he  is  ready  to  lay  down  his  life  for  his 
imprisoned  friend,  and  that  he  is  going  to  Cromwell  to 
offer  himself  body  for  body.1  He  wrote,  with  the  help 
of  two  other  Friends,  the  earliest  account  we  have  of  the 
first  publishing  of  Quakerism  in  New  England.2 

Richard  Doudney's  life  is  unknown  previous  to  his 
American  visit,  and  there  are  no  biographical  details 
available.  His  friends  describe  him  as  "  an  innocent 
man  who  served  the  Lord  in  sincerity."  Robert  Hodgson 
is  likewise  an  obscure  character.  The  most  impressive 
event  of  his  life  known  to  us  is  told  in  the  chapter  on 
the  Planting  of  Quakerism  in  New  York.  There  are 
hints  in  existing  letters  that  he  was  not  always  wise  in 
propagating  the  truth,  and  there  are  rumours  that  he 
"  headed  a  rent  in  Rhode  Island,"  but  these  mutterings 
of  criticism  and  jealousy  in  the  little  band  must  not  be 
taken  too  seriously,  for  they  are  too  commonly  the  sins 
of  the  saints  to  create  surprise  here. 

Mary  Clark  was  the  wife  of  John  Clark,  a  London 
tradesman,  and  had  come  into  fellowship  with  Friends 
about  the  time  of  their  rise  in  London.  She  had  already 
endured  much  for  her  faith,  and  much  was  still  reserved 
for  her  in  America. 

William  Dewsbury  boarded  the  Woodhouse  off  the 
Downs,  3rd  June  1657,  and  gave  the  band  a  word  of 
encouragement.  He  wrote  two  days  later  to  Margaret 
Fell: 

"  They  were  bold  in  the  power  of  the  Lord  and  the  life  did 
arise  in  them  ....  many  dear  children  shall  come  forth  in 
the  power  of  God  in  those  countries  where  they  desire  to  go."3 

On  the  way  to  London  from  Holderness  two  of  the 
sailors  of  the  Woodhouse  had  been  "  impressed  "  for  naval 

1  Journal,  i.  318.     The  letter  is  given  in  full  in  the  Cambridge  Journal, 

2  H.  Norton's  New  England's  Ensign,  1659. 

3  Letter  in  the  Caton  Collection  of  MSS.  in  Bowden,  vol.  i.  p.  68. 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  49 

service,  and  Robert  Fowler  was  left  with  only  two  men 
and  three  boys  to  man  his  ship  for  the  voyage.  At 
Portsmouth,  however,  he  succeeded  in  completing  his 
crew,  though  the  old  sea-captains  there  remarked  that 
they  would  not  go  to  sea  in  such  a  small  vessel  if  Fowler 
would  give  it  to  them.  Fowler's  "  log  "  tells  us  in  curious 
metaphorical  language  that  while  they  were  waiting  at 
Portsmouth,  "  some  of  the  ministers  of  Christ  went  on 
shore  and  gathered  sticks,  and  kindled  a  fire  and  left 
it  burning,"  which  means  that  they  made  converts  and 
started  a  meeting  there.  "  At  South  Yarmouth  again 
we  went  ashore  and  in  some  measure  did  the  like,"  i.e. 
left  more  sticks  burning.  An  interesting  letter  from 
William  Robinson  to  Margaret  Fell  sent  from  Portsmouth, 
refers  to  the  kindling  of  this  fire,  and  indicates  that  two 
more  Friends  were  expected  for  the  voyage.  They  were 
probably  Joseph  Nicholson  and  his  wife  who  reached 
New  England  later.1  The  letter  says  : 

"I  thought  it  meet  to  let  thee  know  that  ye  ship  that 
carries  friends  to  new  ingland,  is  now  riding  in  Portsmouth 
harbour :  we  only  stay  for  a  faire  winde :  ye  two  friends :  ye 
man  and  wife,  which  thou  tould  me  off  when  I  was  at  Swarthmore, 
I  heare  nothing  of  their  cominge  to  London  as  yet. 

"  Robert  Hotchin  is  with  me  at  this  place  for  we  came  heather 
this  afternoon  to  have  a  meeting  at  this  place  seinge  ye  wind  is 
at  present  contrary,  but  we  intend  if  the  Lord  permitt  to  returne 
back  again  to  ye  ship  to-morrow."  2 

Finally,  about  the  middle  of  June,  "  leaving  all  hope 
of  help  as  to  the  outward,"  the  little  vessel  struck  out 
on  its  course.  "  The  Lord  caused  us  to  meet  together 
every  day,"  the  quaint  narrative  says,  "  and  He  Himself 
met  with  us,  and  manifested  Himself  largely  unto  us,  so 
that  by  storms  we  were  not  prevented  [from  meeting] 
above  three  times  in  all  our  voyage,"  and  in  these 
meetings  they  believed  that  they  had  definite  "  openings  " 
as  to  how  to  steer  the  ship. 

On  one  occasion,  as  they  "  were  taking  counsel  of  the 

1  There  is  an  entry  in  the  Kendal  accounts  in  June  1657  of  expenses  "for 
Joseph  Nicholson  and  his  wife  for  New  England." 

2  Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.  126. 


50     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Lord,  the  word  from  Him  was,  'Cut  through  and  steer 
your  straightest  course  and  mind  nothing  but  me.' "  At 
another  time  when  they  believed  themselves  beset  by  men 
of  war,  Humphrey  Norton,  who  seems  to  have  been  the 
"  oracle "  of  the  party,  had  a  revelation  in  the  morning 
that  "  they  were  nigh  unto  us  that  sought  our  lives  "  but 
with  it  came  the  assurance  : 

'"Thus  saith  the  Lord,  ye  shall  be  carried  away  as  in  a  mist.' . . . 
Presently  we  espied  a  great  ship  making  toward  us,  but  in  the 
very  interim,  the  Lord  God  fulfilled  his  promise  wonderfully  to 
our  refreshment."  "Thus  it  was  all  the  voyage,"  the  log 
continues.  "The  faithful  were  carried  far  above  storms  and 
tempests,  and  we  saw  the  Lord  leading  our  vessel  as  it  were  a  man 
leading  a  horse  by  the  head,1  we  regarding  neither  latitude  nor 
longitude  [stc],  but  kept  to  our  Line  [i.e.  our  Light]  which  was 
and  is  our  Leader,  Guide,  and  Rule." 

Two  openings  of  great  comfort  were  granted  to  the 
little  group  which  assured  them  that  they  were  being 
guided  toward  the  land  they  sought.  The  first  inward 
sight  came,  as  the  narrative  puts  it : 

"When  we  had  been  five  weeks  at  sea,  when  the  powers  of 
darkness  appeared  in  the  greatest  strength  against  us,  having 
sailed  but  about  three  hundred  leagues,  Humphrey  Norton, 
falling  into  communion  with  God,  told  me  that  he  had  received 
a  comfortable  answer,  and  that  about  such  a  day  we  should  land 
in  America,  which  was  even  so  fulfilled." 

The  other  opening  came  a  little  before  land  was  sighted : 

"  Our  drawing  had  been  all  the  passage,"  the  account  says, 
"to  keep  to  the  southward,  until  the  evening  before  we  made 
land,  and  then  the  word  was,  '  Let  them  steer  northwards  until 
the  day  following,'  and  soon  after  the  middle  of  the  day  there 
was  a  drawing  to  meet  together  before  our  usual  time  and  it 
was  said  to  us  that  we  should  look  abroad  in  the  evening ;  and 
as  we  sat  waiting  before  the  Lord,  they  discovered  land." 

They  found  that  they  were  "  in  the  '  creek '  which  led 
between  the  Dutch  Plantations  and  Long  Island,  whither 
the  movings  of  some  Friends  called  them." 

1  This  was  a  common  figure  to  express  complete  Divine  guidance.  William 
Edmundson  says  that  he  was  brought  to  a  place  where  he  was  needed,  ' '  by  the 
good  hand  of  God,  as  a  horse  is  led  by  the  bridle." 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  51 

"  The  power  of  the  Lord  fell  much  upon  us  and  an  irresistible 
word  came  unto  us,  '  That  the  seed  in  America  shall  be  as  the 
sand  of  the  sea.'  It  was  published  in  the  ears  of  the  brethren, 
which  caused  tears  to  break  forth  with  fulness  of  joy." 

Robert  Hodgson,  Richard  Doudney,  Sarah  Gibbons, 
Mary  Wetherhead,  and  Dorothy  Waugh,  were  put  on 
shore  at  New  Amsterdam  (now  New  York  City), 
"  whither  they  had  movings,"  and  the  rest  of  the  party 
passed  on  towards  Newport,  meeting  their  closest  danger 
in  the  passage  through  Hell-gate — a  danger  which,  the 
"  log "  says,  was  revealed  in  a  vision  both  to  the  master 
of  the  vessel  and  to  Robert  Hodgson,  several  days  before. 
The  little  band  of  "  apostles "  finally  arrived  safely  at 
Newport,  the  3rd  of  August. 

It  is  evident  that  these  spiritual  Argonauts  took 
themselves  very  seriously.  The  Lord  "led  their  ship, 
as  a  man  leads  a  horse  by  the  head,"  and  He  steered 
their  vessel  "  as  He  did  Noah's  Ark  to  the  hill  Ararat" 
Every  danger  was  "opened"  to  them  in  advance,  and 
they  were  landed  where  they  wished  to  be.  One  sees 
at  once  that  we  are  dealing  here  with  "  enthusiasts  "  and 
not  with  every-day  matter-of-fact  voyagers.  They  had 
no  question  that  they  were  "  sent,"  that  they  were  "guided," 
that  they  were  the  Lord's  prophets,  and  in  this  faith  we 
shall  see  them  meet  their  dangers  and  carry  through  their 
commission.  This  Fowler  document,  like  many  another 
writing  of  the  Friends  in  this  earliest  period,  contains 
many  occurrences  of  a  semi-miraculous  sort.  They  are 
carried  away  from  their  enemies  in  a  mist,  and  they  are 
told  how  to  steer  even  when  they  know  little  or  nothing 
of  latitude  and  longitude.  Religious  literature  furnishes 
many  illustrations  of  the  way  in  which  a  group  of  persons 
living  on  the  verge  of  ecstasy,  and  exalted  by  enthusiastic 
faith,  read  the  miraculous  into  ordinary  happenings,  and 
are  unaware  of  actions  which  they  themselves  perform 
in  a  kind  of  subconscious  state.  There  is  no  necessary 
reason  to  conclude  that  this  "  log  "  is  consciously  improved 
by  the  writer  of  it ;  it  is  almost  certainly  a  naive  but 
honest  account  written  by  an  enthusiast,  who  is  so  sure 


52     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

of  the  Lord's  leading  that  he  unconsciously  belittles  his 
own  knowledge  of  nautical  affairs. 

Humphrey  Norton's  account  of  his  own  "conversion 
experience  "  gives  us  a  pretty  good  glimpse  of  the  type  of 
persons  we  have  before  us.  He  says,  speaking  of  his 
"  convincement  and  call  "  : 

"  In  my  distress — when  gross  darkness  covered  me — I  heard 
a  cry  that  Light  was  broken  forth  and  that  there  was  a  measure 
of  it  given  to  every  man,  but  so  dark  was  I  and  so  grossly  blind, 
that  what  this  Light  was  I  knew  not ;  nor  amongst  all  professors, 
priests  nor  others,  had  I  ever  heard  it  spoken  of,  nor  preached 
for  salvation.  Then  called  I  to  question  all  that  ever  I  had  read 
or  heard,  to  the  last  tittle  of  my  old  belief.  .  .  .  My  desire  to 
live  justly  and  to  enjoy  God,  set  me  to  inquire  after  this  new  Light 
and  what  effect  it  had  amongst  such  as  did  believe  in  it.  I  heard 
that  it  did  convince  of  sin ;  and,  being  believed  in,  obeyed  and 
followed,  led  out  of  all  manner  of  uncleanness.  Then  said  I 
in  my  heart,  if  so,  it  should  not  want  following,  for  I  was  weary 
of  my  sin,  yea  I  loathed  my  life."  "And  believing  in  this 
Light  ...  I  have  obtained  mercy,  peace  with  God,  redemption 
from  all  filthiness  of  flesh  and  spirit,  have  been  made  an  heir 
to  His  kingdom,  a  member  of  His  body,  a  minister  of  His  Spirit, 
and  an  inheritor  of  His  Eternal  rest,  blessed  forever." l 

Rhode  Island  was  the  most  favourable  and  receptive 
spot  in  North  America  for  them  to  light  upon.  It  had 
been  preparing,  as  we  have  seen,  through  a  score  of  years 
for  exactly  the  seed  that  was  now  to  be  sown.  Here  at 
last  was  a  little  corner  of  the  earth  consecrated  to 
freedom  of  belief  and  worship,  where  one  could  follow  his 
inward  Light  without  fear  of  dungeon  or  gibbet.  A 
letter  from  Rhode  Island  was  sent  in  1658  to  John 
Clarke,  the  Agent  of  the  Colony,  to  secure  a  charter  from 
the  English  Government,  urging  him  to  plead  "  that  we 
may  not  be  compelled  to  exercise  any  civil  power  over  men's 
consciences,  so  long  as  human  orders  in  point  of  civilisation 
are  not  corrupted  and  violated."  The  letter  continues : 

"  We  have  now  a  new  occasion  .  .  .  because  a  sort  of  people 
called  by  the  name  of  Quakers  have  come  amongst  us,  and  have 
raised  up  divers  who  seeme  at  present  to  be  of  their  spirit.  .  .  .  Wee 
have  found  noe  just  cause,  to  charge  them  with  the  breach  of 

1  The  Ensign,  pp.  2-3. 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  53 

the  civill  peace,  only  they  are  constantly  goeinge  forth  amongst 
them  about  us  and  vex  and  trouble  them  in  poynt  of  religion 
and  spirituall  state,  though  they  returne  with  many  a  fowle  scarr 
in  their  bodies  for  the  same."  l 

Anne  Hutchinson  herself  was  dead,  but  those  who 
had  shared  her  views  and  had  gone  into  exile  with  her 
were  admirable  material  for  a  Quaker  meeting.  Mary 
Dyer,  Anne  Hutchinson's  closest  friend  in  her  hour  of 
hard  trial,  had  just  returned  from  England  to  her  home 
in  Rhode  Island,  having  had  her  first  taste  of  Boston 
jail  on  her  landing.  While  in  England  she  had  become 
"  convinced "  of  the  truth  of  the  Quaker  message,  had 
thrown  in  her  lot  with  the  new  Society,  and  had  already 
been  recognised  as  a  minister  of  that  faith.  She  was 
thus  a  dynamic  Quaker  nucleus  to  begin  with.  Some  of 
the  foremost  families  among  the  founders  of  the  Rhode 
Island  Colony — William  Coddington,  Joshua  Coggeshall, 
son  of  John,  Nicholas  Easton  and  his  son  John,  and 
Walter  Clarke,  son  of  Jeremiah  Clarke,  an  original 
founder,  appear  to  have  accepted  the  Quaker  faith  as 
soon  as  they  heard  it,  and  at  once  became  pillars  in  the 
first  Quaker  meeting  in  the  New  World.  With  them 
came  over  to  Quakerism,  it  would  seem,  a  large  number 
of  the  inhabitants  of  the  island,  and  the  pilgrims  from  the 
Woodhouse  must  have  thought  that  their  dream  of  a 
"  seed  like  the  sand  of  the  sea-shore "  was  well  on  its 
way  to  be  realised ! 2  Only  four  years  from  the  time  of 

1  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,  vol.  i.  pp.  396-397. 

2  Callender  in  his  Historical  Discourse  says  :   "In  1657  some  of  the  people 
called  Quakers  came  to  this   Colony  and  Island ;   and  being  persecuted  and 
abused  in  the  other  Colonies,  that  together  with  the  opinions  and  circumstances 
of  the  people  here,  gave  them  a  large  harvest ;  many,  and  some  of  the  Baptist 
Church  [of  which   Callender   was   a  member]   embraced   their   doctrines   and 
particular    opinions,    to   which    many    of    their    posterity,     and    others,    still 
adhere." — p.  118. 

John  Rous,  7th  Nov.  1657,  writing  from  Rhode  Island,  challenged  Governor 
Endicott  to  arrange  for  a  meeting  with  the  Massachusetts  officials  for  a  free 
discussion  of  the  Quaker  faith,  and  he  asks  Endicott  to  send  his  answer  to 
Nicholas  Easton  who  was  thus  already  a  convinced  Friend. — Ensign,  p.  59. 

Peterson  says,  in  his  History  of  Rhode  Island,  under  date  of  1656  (it  should  be 
1657):  "This  year  some  of  the  people  called  Quakers  came  to  this  Colony, 
being  persecuted  and  abused  in  the  other  Colonies,  and  many  of  the  principal 
inhabitants  embraced  their  doctrines,  among  whom  were  William  Coddington, 
Nicholas  Easton  and  his  two  sons,  Philip  Shearman,  Adam  Mott,  and  many 
others  (p.  36). 


54     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

the  landing  of  these  "  Argonauts  "  at  Newport,  an  annual 
meeting  was  established  on  the  island,  to  which  the 
Friends,  springing  up  in  scattered  parts  of  New  England, 
largely  through  their  labours,  came  year  after  year — a 
meeting  which,  under  the  name  of  "  The  Yearly  Meeting 
for  Friends  in  New  England,"  has  had  a  continuous 
history  to  the  present  day.1 

The  cordial  reception  which  the  settlers  on  Rhode 
Island  gave  the  Quakers,  and  the  formation  here  of  a 
base  of  operations  and  a  quiet  retreat  from  the  storms  of 
persecution,  at  once  aroused  the  Puritan  colonies.  They 
had  formerly  refused  to  admit  Rhode  Island  as  a  member 
of  the  Union  of  New  England  colonies,  but  now  they 
showed  themselves  eager  for  co-operation  in  the  face  of 
common  danger  which  menaced  their  peace,  if  not  their 
spiritual  empire.  On  the  I2th  of  September  1657 
the  Commissioners  of  the  United  Colonies,  "  being  in 
formed  that  divers  Quakers  are  arrived  this  summer  at 
Rhode  Island  which  may  prove  dangerous  to  the 
Colonies,"  "  thought  meet  to  manifest  their  minds "  in  a 
letter  to  those  in  authority  in  Rhode  Island. 

"  We  suppose,"  they  wrote,  "  you  have  understood  that 
last  year  a  companie  of  Quakers  arrived  in  Boston  upon 
noe  other  account  than  to  disperse  theire  pernicious 
opinions,"  and  then  they  recount  how  by  "  prudent  care  " 
they  have  seen  to  it  that  "  all  Quakers,  Ranters,  and  such 
notorious  heretiques  might  be  prohibited  coming  among 

1  There  seems  no  uncertainty  about  the  year  in  which  this  meeting  was 
established.  George  Bishop  says:  "About  that  time  [i.e.  1661]  the  General 
Meeting  at  Rhode  Island,  about  sixty  miles  from  Boston,  was  set  up  and 
you  [the  inhabitants  of  Boston],  made  an  Alarm  that  the  Quakers  were 
gathering  together  to  kill  the  people  and  fire  the  town  of  Boston  ! " — New 
England  Judged,  p.  351.  John  Burnyeat  also  gives  valuable  testimony  in  his 
Journal.  He  writes  :  "I  took  shipping  for  Rhode  Island,  and  was  there  at  their 
Yearly  Meeting  in  1671  which  begins  the  ninth  of  the  Fourth  month  (June,  new 
style)  every  year  and  continues  much  of  a  week,  and  is  a  General  Meeting  once  a 
year  for  all  Friends  in  New  England." — Burnyeat's  Journal  (Barclay's  reprint), 
p.  196.  George  Rofe  appears  to  have  been  the  "beginner"  of  this  Yearly 
Meeting.  He  was  in  New  England  in  the  summer  of  1661  and  he  writes  from 
Barbadoes  of  that  visit :  "  We  came  in  [i.e.  landed]  at  Rhode  Island,  and  we 
appointed  a  General  Meeting  for  all  Friends  in  those  parts,  which  was  a  very 
great  meeting  and  very  precious,  and  continued  four  days  together  and  the  Lord 
was  with  His  people  and  blessed  them.  There  is  a  good  seed  and  the  seed 
will  arise." — George  Rofe  to  Richard  Hubberthorne,  A.R.B.  Collection,  No.  62 
(Devonshire  House,  London). 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  55 

us "  and  that  "  such  as  arise  from  amongst  ourselves " 
shall  be  "  removed."  "  But,"  they  continue,  "  it  is  by 
experience  found  that  meanes  will  fall  short  without 
further  care  by  reason  of  your  admission  and  receiving 
of  such,  from  whence  they  may  have  opportunity  to 
creep  in  amongst  us,  or  meanes  to  infuse  and  spread 
their  accursed  tenates  to  the  great  trouble  of  the 
colonies,  if  not  to  the  subversion  of  the  lawes  professed 
in  them."  "  To  preserve  us,"  this  is  their  appeal,  "  from 
such  a  pest,  the  contagion  of  which  within  your  colony 
were  dangerous,  we  request  that  you  take  such  order 
herein  that  your  neighbors  may  be  freed  from  that 
danger,  that  you  remove  those  Quakers  that  have  been 
receaved,  and  for  the  future  prohibite  their  cominge 
amongst  you." l 

The  Rhode  Island  answer,  signed  by  Benedict  Arnold, 
President  of  the  Colony,  I3th  October  1657,15  a  dignified 
refusal  to  swerve  from  the  settled  policy  of  toleration. 

"Our  desires  are,"  they  say,  "in  all  things  possible,  to 
pursue  after  and  keepe  fayre  and  loveing  correspondence  and 
entercourse  with  all  the  colonys,"  and  they  add  that  they  will 
return  all  persons  that  "  fly  from  justice  in  matters  of  crime  " — 
"  but  as  concerning  these  which  are  now  among  us,  we  have  no 
law  among  us  whereby  to  punish  any  for  only  declaring  by  words, 
their  mindes  and  understandings  concerning  the  things  and  ways  of 
God,  as  to  salvation  and  an  eternal  condition."  .  .  .  "And  as  to 
the  dammage  that  may  in  likelyhood  accrue  to  the  neighbor 
collonys  by  theire  being  here  entertained,  we  conceive  it  will 
not  prove  so  dangerous  as  the  course  taken  by  you  to  send 
them  away  out  of  the  country  as  they  come  among  you." 2 

This  letter,  above  quoted,  was  sent  by  the  "  Court  of 
Trials."  Five  months  later  the  General  Assembly  of  the 
colony  sent  a  Letter  to  Governor  Endicott  of  Massachusetts 
to  be  imparted  to  the  Commissioners  of  the  United 
Colonies  in  which  the  principle  of  freedom  is  again  as 
stoutly  asserted :  "  Freedom  of  conscience  we  still  prize 
as  the  greatest  hapines  that  man  can  posess  in  this 
world."  Quakers,  they  say,  as  all  other  people  who 

1  Records  of  the  Colony  of  Rhode  Island,  \.  374-376. 
2  Ibid.  i.  376-378. 


56     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

come  to  Rhode  Island,  must  be  subject  to  all  civil  duties 
and  preserve  peace  and  justice,  and  if  the  aforesaid 
Quakers  fail  in  these  respects  "  to  the  corruptings  of 
good  manners  and  disturbinge  the  common  peace  and 
sosieties  " — 

"  We  shall  present  the  matter  unto  the  supream  authority  of 
England,  humbly  craveing  their  advice  and  order,  how  to  carry 
ourselves  in  any  further  respect  towards  these  people  soe  that 
therewithall  theire  may  be  noe  damadge  or  infringement  of  that 
chiefe  principle  in  our  charter  concerninge  freedom  of  consciences, 
and  we  alsoe  are  soe  much  the  more  encouraged  to  make  our 
addresses  unto  the  Lord  Protector,  for  that  we  understand  there 
are  or  have  beene  many  of  the  foresayed  people  suffered  to  live 
in  England ;  yea  even  in  the  heart  of  the  nation." l 

It  was  thus  settled  from  the  start  that  the  Quakers 
were  to  be  absolutely  safe  in  Rhode  Island,  if  nothing 
could  be  urged  against  them  except  peculiarity  of 
religious  opinions,  and  the  time  was  not  far  distant  when 
they  were  to  become  the  actual  rulers  of  the  Colony,  as 
we  shall  see.  But,  as  the  Letter  from  the  "  Court  of 
Trial "  of  Rhode  Island  says,  the  Quakers  were  not 
satisfied  to  stay  where  there  was  no  opposition.2 

This  was,  however,  not  because  they  liked  opposition 
and  enjoyed  a  fight,  but  because  they  believed  that  they 
had  come  over  to  America  under  a  commission  from  the 
Most  High  to  sow  their  seed  of  truth  in  the  soil  of 
Massachusetts.  They  rejoiced  in  the  spread  of  truth  on 
the  safe  island  in  the  Narragansett,  and  they  were  glad 
to  see  the  "  seed "  spring  up  there,  but  they  were 
especially  thankful  for  a  safe  base  of  operations  for  the 
more  strenuous  campaign  for  which  they  had  come  over  ; 
and  it  was  just  because  this  "  campaign "  was  proving 
effective  that  that  Letter  from  the  Commissioners  of  the 
United  Colonies  was  written. 

A  Letter  of  John  Copeland's,  written  a  week  after  the 
Woodhouse  came  into  Newport,  says  : 

1  Records  of  the  Colony  of  Rhode  Island,  i.  378-380. 

2  ' '  We  finde  that  in  those  places  where  these  people  aforesaid,  in  this  Colony 
are  most  of  all  suffered  to  declare  themselves  freely,  and  are  only  opposed  by 
arguments  in  discourse,  there  they  least  of  all  desire  to  come." — Op.  cit.  p.  377. 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  57 

"  Christopher  Holder  and  I  are  going  to  Martha's  Vineyard 
in  obedience  to  the  will  of  our  God,  whose  will  is  our  joy. 
Humphrey  Norton  is  at  present  in  Rhode  Island,  Mary  Clark 
is  waiting  to  go  toward  Boston ;  William  Brend  is  towards 
Providence.  The  Lord  God  of  Hosts  is  with  us,  the  shout  of  a 
King  is  amongst  us ;  the  people  fear  our  God  ! " x 

Mary  Clark  had  come  over  under  a  "  special  moving  " 
to  bear  her  testimony  in  Boston.  She  was,  as  Bishop 
tells  us,  "the  mother  of  children,  having  a  husband  in 
England  whom  she  left,  being  moved  to  come  unto  you."  2 
She  delivered  her  message,  but  it  was  answered  by  twenty 
stripes  of  a  three-corded  whip,  "  laid  on  with  fury,"  then 
with  twelve  weeks  of  prison  silence,  and  then  she  was 
sent  out  of  the  jurisdiction  in  winter  season,  probably 
back  to  Rhode  Island.3  A  little  later  she  went  to  her 
death  by  shipwreck. 

Holder  and  Copeland  were  to  have  more  visible  fruit  for 
their  labour.  They  went,  as  planned,  to  Martha's  Vineyard 
where  they  met  only  stern  rebuff  from  the  white  settlers, 
though  the  Indians  were  kind  to  them,  took  them  in,  saying, 
"  you  are  strangers  and  the  Lord  has  taught  us  to  love 
strangers," 4  and  finally  carried  them  in  their  canoes  to  the 
mainland  of  Massachusetts.  The  travellers  started  now 
directly  on  foot  through  the  woods  for  Sandwich,  which, 
like  Newport,  was  receptive  soil  for  their  truth,  partly 
owing,  perhaps,  to  the  quiet  work  of  Nicholas  Upsall 
who  had  spent  the  preceding  winter  there  in  exile.6 

1  Quoted  from  'Bov/deristfistory  of  Friends  in America,  vol.  i.  p.  67.     William 
Robinson  was  apparently  labouring  in  Rhode  Island  though  he  is  not  mentioned. 

2  New  England  Judged,  p.  50.     See  also  Besse's  Sufferings,  vol.  ii.  p.  181. 

8  Mary  Clark  was  the  first  Quaker  woman  in  America  to  suffer  whipping  for 
her  religious  views.  She  had  many  followers,  however. 

4  Norton's  Ensign,  p.  22. 

8  A  magistrate  of  Plymouth  Colony  calles  Nicholas  Upsall  ' '  the  instigator 
of  all  this  [Quaker]  mischief."' — History  of  Bamstable  County,  p.  169.  I  am 
convinced  that  there  were  a  number  of  centres  in  the  Plymouth  Colony  where 
there  were  "seekers"  and  where  there  was  no  loyal  support  for  the  existing 
system.  There  is  in  existence  a  Letter  from  the  Governor  and  Magistrates  of 
Massachusetts  which  supports  this  view.  It  is  dated  2nd  Sept.  1656,  and  was 
written  to  the  Commissioners  of  the  United  Colonies,  telling  of  the  arrival  of  Quakers 
who  are  "  fitt  Instruments  to  propogate  the  Kingdome  of  Sathan,"  and  urging  the 
"beloved  Brethren  and  Naighbors  of  the  collonie  of  Plymouth"  to  make 
preparation  for  guarding  against  "such  pests."  The  Letter  says  that  there  is  a 
great  lack  in  Plymouth  Colony  of  "  a  due  acknowledgement  of  and  encouragement 
to  the  Minnesters  of  the  Gosspell."  There  has  been  apparently  "a  crying  downe 


58     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

"  Their  arrival,"  Bowden  says,  "  was  hailed  with  feelings 
of  satisfaction  by  many  who  were  sincere  seekers  after 
heavenly  riches,  but  who  had  long  been  burdened  with  a 
lifeless  ministry  and  dead  forms  of  religion." l  Sandwich 
was  a  town  of  Plymouth  Colony  and  if  it  had  its  "  sincere 
seekers,"  it  also  had  its  proportion  of  persons  who  stood 
for  the  status  quo.  Humphrey  Norton  has  given  us  a 
lively  account  of  the  commotion  : 

"  Great  was  the  stir  and  noise  of  the  tumultuous  town,  yea, 
all  in  an  uproar,  hearing  that  we,  who  were  called  by  such  a 
name  as  Quakers,  were  come  into  those  parts.  A  great  fire  was 
kindled  and  the  hearts  of  many  did  burn  within  them,  so  that  in 
the  heat  thereof  some  said  one  thing  and  some  said  another ; 
but  the  most  part  knew  not  what  was  the  matter." 2 

The  two  Quaker  missionaries,  after  two  trips  to  the 
town  of  Plymouth,  one  of  them  a  forced  trip,  and  after 
being  "  conveyed  six  miles "  toward  Rhode  Island  by  a 
constable  who  hoped  in  vain  that  they  would  not  come 
back — were  finally  arrested  "  as  extravagant  persons  and 
vagabonds,"  and  conveyed  fifty  miles  in  the  direction  of 
Rhode  Island,  with  a  threat  of  being  whipped,  if  they  ever 
returned,  which  thing  they  were  pretty  certain  to  do ! 
They  had  made  only  a  short  visit  in  the  town  of  Sandwich, 
but  the  results  of  it  were  great.  A  number  of  the 
leading  townspeople  were  convinced  by  this  first  visit 
and  were  henceforth  ready  to  risk  goods  and  lives  for 
their  new  views  of  truth,  a  risk  they  were  very  soon 
called  to  face.  One  of  the  magistrates  of  the  town 
writing  the  year  following — December  1658 — says  that 
the  Quakers  "  have  many  meetings  and  many  adherents, 
almost  the  whole  town  of  Sandwich  is  adhering  towards 
them."8  The  records  show  that  seventy- five  persons 
were  presented  in  court  during  that  year  for  attending 
"  meeting,"  and  this  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  there  was  a 
fine  of  forty  shillings  placed  upon  every  person  who 

of  minnestry  and  rainnesters"  and  the  Letter  declares  that  the  way  to  meet  this 
"new  engine  of  Sathan "  is  to  "reinstate  a  pious  orthodox  minnestry" — 
Plymouth  Records,  vol.  ii.  p.  156. 

1  Of.  cit.  i.  71.  2  Ensign,  p.  22. 

8  Letter  of  Justice  James  Cudworth,  printed  in  Besse,  ii.  p.  191,  and  in  New 
England  Judged,  p.  168. 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  59 

allowed  a  Quaker  meeting  in  his  house  and  a  fine  of  ten 
shillings  for  every  "  hearer "  who  attended,  "  yea  and  if 
nothing  be  spoken  at  the  meeting,  as  it  sometimes  falls 
out ! " x 

The  extent  of  the  "  convincement "  comes  to  light 
in  a  passage  from  Cotton  Mather's  Life  of  Rev. 
Samuel  Newman :  "  How  many  straits  he  underwent  in 
that  dark  day  when  he  was  almost  the  only  minister 
whose  invincible  patience  held  out  under  the  scandalous 

1  See  Cudworth's  Letter.  The  first  law  against  the  Quakers  in  the  Plymouth 
Colony  was  passed  in  1657  and  is  an  interesting  "relic."  It  is  as  follows: 
"Whereas  there  hath  severall  psons  come  into  this  Govrment  comonly  called 
Quakers  whose  doctrines  and  practises  manifestly  tends  to  the  subversion  of  the 
foundamentals  of  Christian  Religion,  Church  Order  and  Civill  peace  of  this 
Govrment  as  appeers  by  the  Testimonies  given  in  sundry  depositions  and 
otherwise.  It  is  therefore  enacted  by  the  Court  and  the  Authority  thereof  that 
noe  Quaker  or  pson  comonly  soe  called  bee  entertained  by  any  pson  or  psons 
within  this  Govrment  under  the  penaltie  of  five  pounds  for  every  such  default  or 
bee  whipt ;  It  is  also  enacted  by  this  Court  and  the  Authority  therof  that  if  any 
Rantor  or  Quaker  or  pson  comonly  soe  called  shall  come  into  any  towne 
within  this  Govrment,  and  by  any  pson  or  psons  bee  knowne  or  suspected  to  bee 
such  the  pson  so  knowing  or  suspecting  him  shall  forthwith  acquaint  the 
Constable  or  his  deputie  of  them  on  paine  of  Presentment  and  soe  liable  to 
cencure  in  Court  whoe  [i.e.  the  magistrate]  forthwith  on  such  notice  of  them  or 
any  other  Intelligence  hee  shall  have  of  them  shall  dilligently  endeavor  to 
apprehend  him  or  them  and  bring  them  before  some  one  of  the  majestrates  whoe 
shall  cause  him  or  them  to  bee  comitted  to  Goale,  there  to  be  kept  close 
prisoners  with  such  victualls  onely  as  the  Court  aloweth  untill  he  or  they  shall 
defray  the  charge  both  of  theire  Imprisonment  and  theire  Transportation  away  ; 
Together  with  an  engagement  to  returne  into  this  Gov'ment  noe  more  or  else  to 
be  continewed  in  close  durance  till  further  orders  from  the  Court.  And  forasmuch 
as  the  meetings  of  such  psons  whether  strangers  or  others  proveth  disturbing  to 
the  peace  of  this  Govrment.  It  is  therefore  enacted  by  the  Court  and  the 
Authority  thereof  that  henceforth  noe  such  meetings  bee  assembled  or  kept  by 
any  pson  in  any  place  within  this  Govrment  under  the  penaltie  of  forty  shillings  a 
time  for  every  speaker  and  ten  shillings  a  time  for  every  hearer  that  are  heads  of 
families  and  forty  shillings  a  time  for  the  owner  of  the  place  that  pmits  them  soe 
to  meet  together ;  and  if  they  meet  together  att  theire  silent  meetings  soe  called 
then  every  pson  soe  meeting  together  shall  pay  ten  shillings  a  time  and  the  owner 
of  the  place  forty  shillings  a  time." — Plymouth  Records,  vol.  xi.  pp.  100-101.  In 
1658,  it  was  decreed  :  "  Noe  Quaker  or  Rantor  or  any  such  corrupt  pson  shall 
be  admitted  to  be  a  freeman."  "All  such  as  refuse  to  take  the  oath  of 
fidelitie  as  quakers  shall  have  noe  voat  or  shall  be  imployed  in  any  place  of 
trust"  (ibid.  p.  100).  In  1659  it  was  declared  "  that  many  persons  in  Plymouth 
Colony  are  being  corrupted  by  reading  Quaker  books,  writings  and  Epislles 
which  are  widely  distributed, "  it  was  therefore  decreed  that  all  such  books  shall 
be  seized  (ibid.  p.  121).  In  1660,  it  is  noted  that  the  Quakers  "have  bine 
furnished  with  horses  and  thereby  they  have  made  speedy  passage  from  place  to 
place  poisoning  the  Inhabitants  with  their  cursed  tennetts,"  it  is  therefore  decreed 
that  "  if  any  one  shall  furnish  them  with  a  horse  or  horse  kind,  the  same  shall  be 
seized  on  for  the  use  of  the  government"  (ibid.  p.  126).  In  June  1661  it  was 
decreed  that  "  Quakers  and  such  like  vagabonds"  shall  "bee  whipt  with  rodds 
soe  it  exceed  not  fifteen  stripes  "  and  made  to  depart  the  government "  (ibid. 
pp.  129-130). 


60     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

neglect  and  contempt  of  the  ministry  which  for  a  while 
the  whole  country  of  Plymouth  was  bewitched  into  ! " 

It  appears  from  Justice  Cudworth's  Letter  that  the 
Court  had  just  imposed  fines  amounting  to  one  hundred 
and  fifty  pounds  on  the  new  Quaker  disciples,  and  yet  they 
steadily  increased  in  number.  A  poor  man,  himself  lame, 
father  of  seven  or  eight  children,  had  his  two  cows  taken 
from  him  for  attending  meeting.  "  What  are  you  going 
to  do  now  ? "  the  marshal!  asked,  as  he  drove  away  the 
cows.  "  God  who  has  given  me  these  will  still  provide 
for  us,"  was  the  poor  man's  answer,  and  he  stood  by  his 
faith. 

One  of  the  most  dramatic  incidents  of  the  period  was 
the  convincement  of  Isaac  Robinson  and  his  influence  in 
the  formation  of  a  Quaker  centre  in  Falmouth.  He  was 
a  son  of  the  famous  "  Separatist "  pastor,  John  Robinson. 
In  1659  the  General  Court  of  Plymouth  sent  Isaac 
Robinson  and  three  others  to  attend  Quaker  meetings 
in  order  to  endeavour  to  "  reduce  them  from  the  error 
of  their  ways." 1  Instead  of  convincing  the  Quakers 
of  error,  he  himself  became  convinced  of  their  truth, 
embraced  their  doctrines  and  was  dismissed  from  civil 
employment  in  the  Colony.  He  was  faithful  to  his 
father's  advice  to  "expect  the  breaking  out  of  more 
light !  "  Finding  life  now  uncomfortable  in  his  old  home 
he,  with  thirteen  others,  sailed  around  the  cape  to  the 
Succoneset  shore,  where  he  built  the  first  house  in 
Falmouth  and  became  a  leader  of  the  Quaker  group  in 
this  town. 

The  beginning  was  thus  made.  Almost  simultaneously 
two  Quaker  meetings  sprang  into  being,  one  in  Newport 
and  the  other  in  Sandwich,  and  when  Christopher  Holder 
and  John  Copeland  returned  to  Newport  they  had  the 
satisfaction  of  feeling  that  there  were  at  least  two  live 
centres  in  the  new  land.  Holder  and  Copeland  had 
hardly  left  the  Plymouth  Colony  when  another  Woodhouse 
passenger,  Humphrey  Norton,  appeared  there  and  carried 

1  Records  of  Plymouth  Colony,  xi.  p.  124.     It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  one 
of  John  Winthrop's  sons,  Samuel,  joined  Friends. 


CH.  in  THE  FOUNDERS  61 

forward  the  work  the  other  two  had  begun.  He,  too,  was 
soon  in  the  hands  of  the  authorities,  and  was  charged 
with  holding  the  doctrine  of  a  Light  within  sufficient  for 
salvation.  His  answer  was  that  the  Scriptures  say  that 
"  the  Grace  of  God  that  bringeth  salvation  hath  appeared 
unto  all  men,"  and  they  also  say  that  this  "  Grace  is 
sufficient."  "  This  little  grain,"  the  Ensign  says,  "  stopped 
the  lion's  mouth."  Norton  was  thereupon  conveyed  fifty 
miles  toward  Rhode  Island,  and  as  he  went  out  of  the 
Colony,  William  Brend  came  in,  to  continue  the  work. 
The  latter,  together  with  John  Copeland  and  Sarah 
Gibbons,  who  joined  him,  soon  formed  a  very  live  Quaker 
circle  in  the  town  of  Scituate.  They  won  to  their  cause 
a  noble-minded  magistrate  named  Timothy  Hatherly,  but 
notwithstanding  his  friendship  they  were  given  a  cruel 
scourging  before  they  got  away  from  the  Colony.1 

After  an  unusually  terrible  experience  in  New  Haven, 
where  he  was  flogged  and  branded  with  an  H,  Humphrey 
Norton  went  once  more  into  Plymouth  Colony.2  Before 
going  forth  on  this  second  expedition  to  the  country  of 
the  Pilgrims,  Norton  passed  through  a  profound  inward 
experience  of  God's  "  call "  to  Plymouth,  attended  with 
an  overwhelming  sense  that  sufferings  were  awaiting  him 
there.  John  Rous,  who  had  recently  arrived  from 
Barbadoes,3  was  his  companion  on  this  perilous  journey. 
They  reached  Plymouth  the  first  of  June  1658,  and  were 
immediately  arrested  and  imprisoned.  The  examination 
of  their  doctrines  failed  to  show  them  to  be  "heretics," 
though  Governor  Prince  called  them  "  Papists  and  Jesuits 
and  inordinate  fellows,"  but  they  were  finally  brought 

1  It  is  a  persistent  tradition  that  the  Pilgrims  of  Plymouth  Colony  did  not 
persecute  other  Christians  who  differed  from  them  in  faith.  If  they  had  not  been 
powerfully  urged  to  take  extreme  measures  to  guard  their  heritage  perhaps  they 
would  have  given  the  freedom  which  they  came  to  seek.  But  any  one  who  believes 
that  they  did  not  persecute  would  soon  have  that  idea  expelled  by  reading  either 
Norton's  Ensign  or  Bishop's  New  England  Judged.  One  is  sorry  to  discover 
that  John  Alden  was  one  of  the  magistrates  who  took  part  in  the  harrying  of  the 
Quakers  in  Plymouth  Colony. 

a  He  tells  us  that,  during  this  New  Haven  ordeal  when  the  spectators  thought 
he  was  being  killed,  he  so  felt  the  Presence  of  the  Lord  that  ' '  he  was  as  if  covered 
with  balm." — Ensign,  p.  51. 

1  John  Rous,  William  Leddra,  and  Thomas  Harris  came  together  to  New 
England  from  Barbadoes  near  the  end  of  1657. 


62     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

under  sentence  for  refusing  to  take  an  oath — a  very 
common  trap  for  catching  a  Quaker  when  no  criminal 
charge  could  be  established.  For  this  fault  they  were 
scourged,  though  the  people  thronged  about  them  to 
shake  their  hands  and  as  usual  they  advanced  their  cause 
by  their  sufferings  for  it.  "  This  persecution,"  writes  John 
Rous,  "  did  prove  much  for  the  advantage  of  truth  ;  for 
Friends  did  with  much  boldness  own  us  openly  in  it,  and 
it  did  work  deeply  with  many."  It  must  have  done  so, 
for  the  whole  southern  part  of  Massachusetts  was,  as  we 
shall  see,  honeycombed  with  Quakerism  by  the  year  1660. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE    MARTYRS 

NEARLY  simultaneously  with  the  invasion  of  Plymouth 
Colony  and  of  Newport  by  the  Quaker  missionaries, 
William  Brend,  the  veteran  missionary  of  the  Woodhouse 
party,  had  been  proclaiming  his  Truth  in  the  city  of 
Providence  and  the  surrounding  regions.  Roger  Williams, 
though  heroically  devoted  to  liberty  of  thought  and 
speech,  was  by  mental  constitution  and  temperament 
impervious  to  the  message  of  the  Friends.  He  was  by 
natural  bent  of  mind  unmystical,  and  he  had  no  sympathy 
with  the  idea  of  inward  personal  revelations.  He  was  as 
ready  as  any  of  the  great  theologians  of  Massachusetts  to 
give  his  reasons  for  the  hope  that  was  in  him,  and  he  stood 
possessed  of  a  very  definite  set  of  doctrines  and  practices, 
which  were  to  his  mind  essential  to  a  right  conception  of 
Christianity,  but,  like  Gamaliel  and  unlike  most  of  his 
contemporaries,  he  was  willing  to  allow  others  to  try  their 
faith  undisturbed. 

There  were  others  in  the  Providence  community, 
however,  who  were  already  predisposed  to  the  Quaker 
Truth.  The  most  important  person  in  the  prepared  circle 
at  Providence  was  Catherine  Scott,  a  sister  of  Anne 
Hutchinson.  She  was  the  wife  of  Richard  Scott,  a  man 
of  considerable  standing  and  influence  in  the  colony  at 
the  head  of  Narragansett  Bay.  The  Quaker  missionaries 
always  seem  guided  by  an  unerring  instinct  to  prepared 
families  like  this  one  of  Richard  Scott's,  and  here  in  this 
home  the  first  conquests  to  the  new  faith  in  Providence 
were  made.  We  shall  hear  later  of  the  heroic  mettle  of 
the  women  of  this  household. 

63 


64     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

The  next  locality  to  be  selected  for  missionary  effort 
was  the  town  of  Salem.  Like  Newport  and  Sandwich 
this  historic  town  already  had  a  little  company  of 
spiritually-minded  people  who  were  dissatisfied  with  a 
"  covenant  of  Works,"  and  who  longed  for  the  day-dawn 
and  for  the  arising  of  the  Day  Star  in  their  hearts.  There 
is  a  remarkable  passage  in  a  letter  written  in  1657  from 
Barbadoes  by  Henry  Fell  to  Margaret  Fell  of  Swarthmore 
Hall,  in  which  he  mentions  Plymouth  Colony  and  Salem 
as  two  places  where  a  spiritual  "  seed "  can  easily  be 
cultivated. 

"In  Plimouth  patent,"  he  says,  "there  is  a  people  not  soe 
ridged  as  the  others  at  Boston  and  there  are  great  desires  among 
them  after  the  Truth.  Some  there  are,  as  I  hear,  convinced 
who  meet  in  silence  at  a  place  called  Salem.  Oh  truly  great  is 
the  desire  of  my  soule  towards  them  and  the  love  that  flows  out 
after  them  dayly,  for  I  see  in  the  Eternal  Light  the  Lord  hath  a 
great  worke  to  do  in  that  nation."  l 

There  is  an  interesting  passage  bearing  on  this  Salem 
group,  in  Cotton  Mather's  Magnalia  : 

"  I  can  tell  the  world  that  the  first  Quakers  that  ever  were  in 
the  world  were  certain  fanaticks  here  in  our  town  of  Salem,  who 
held  forth  almost  all  the  fancies  and  whimsies  which  a  few  years 
after  [Mather  thinks  Quakerism  began  in  England  in  1652]  were 
broached  by  them  that  were  so  called  in  England,  with  whom  yet 
none  of  ours  had  the  least  communication"  * 

There  had  been  influences  at  work  in  Salem  for  a 
score  of  years  which  tended  to  form  such  a  group  as 
that  here  revealed.  Roger  Williams,  though  only  a  lay- 
preacher,  had  been  chosen  minister  of  the  Salem  Church 
in  1 63 1,  and,  after  a  period  of  similar  service  in  Plymouth 
Colony,  had  been  invited  back  to  Salem  as  minister  in 
1634.  Though  not  a  mystic  and  not  encouraging  faith 
in  inward  guidance,  yet  he  was  a  powerful  advocate 
of  "  independency  "  in  religion — the  absolute  separation 
of  religion  from  State  control — and  he  insisted  that  every 
act  of  religion  should  be  a  personal  matter,  belonging 

1  Letter  in  Swarthmore  Collection,  i.  66. 

2  Magnalia  (Hartford  ed.  of  1853),  ii.  523. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  65 

within  the  private  domain  of  the  worshipper  himself.  He 
was  utterly  opposed  to  tithes  or  to  any  forced  support  of 
religion.  That  he  had  many  supporters  in  Salem  is 
beyond  question,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  his 
powerful  personality  and  his  vigorous  exposition  carried 
many  members  of  the  Church  out  of  the  ruts  of  orthodoxy. 
There  were,  too,  many  immigrants  in  Lynn  and  Salem 
who  were  of  the  "  Seeker "  type,  others  who  held  the 
position  of  the  Anabaptists,  persons  who  had  come  thither 
expecting  to  find  freedom  for  their  "  seeking "  and  for 
their  independent  views.  One  of  the  most  prominent 
persons  of  this  type  was  Lady  Deborah  Moody,  who  was 
forced  to  migrate  to  Long  Island,  where  we  shall  again 
meet  her.1  Many  of  her  sympathisers  went  with  her, 
but  many  also  remained  behind  and  quietly  cultivated 
their  freer  and  more  liberal  form  of  religion.  In  such 
ways  and  under  such  influences  there  had  developed  in 
this  stronghold  of  orthodoxy  a  fellowship  of  persons  who 
were  in  positive  dissent  from  the  established  form  of  faith 
and  practice,  and  who  were  ready  to  follow  the  lead  of  the 
Quaker  messengers. 

It  is  a  mystery  how  the  news  of  this  "  spiritual  circle  " 
in  Salem  got  to  Barbadoes  in  1657,  for  no  Friends  had 
yet  been  there,  but  it  is  probable  that  Mary  Fisher  and 
Ann  Austin  heard  of  it  while  they  were  in  Boston  and 
carried  the  report  back  with  them.  In  any  case,  it  was 
true ;  and  as  soon  as  Christopher  Holder  and  John 
Copeland  had  accomplished  their  first  piece  of  work  in 
Plymouth  Colony — "where  there  were  desires  after  the 
truth" — they  started  out  from  Rhode  Island  (which  Henry 
Fell,  in  the  above-mentioned  letter,  says  the  Puritans  called 
"  the  island  of  error ")  for  the  more  hazardous  enterprise 
in  Salem,  where  the  little  group  of  "convinced  wor 
shipers"  were  waiting  for  encouragement.  They  seem 
to  have  sought  out  in  secret  the  persons  who  were  favour 
ably  inclined  to  their  message  before  they  made  their 
risky  appeal  to  the  Salem  public.  Humphrey  Norton  says 
that  they  told  their  little  group  of  listeners  "the  things 

1  Book  II.  chap.  i. 

F 


66     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

which  they  had  seen  and  heard  and  their  hands  had  handled 
of  the  word  of  life" — which  means  that  they  did  what  all 
true  religious  leaders  do,  they  endeavoured  to  transmit  an 
experience  rather  than  to  discourse  on  abstract  doctrines, 
and  he  tells  us  further  that  "  the  Word  was  soon  ingrafted 
in  their  hearers,"  so  that  in  a  short  time  they,  too,  became 
"  possessors  of  the  same  experience  and  fellow-sufferers 
with  their  teachers  ! "  -1 

But  they  were  not  content  to  do  their  work  in  a  corner. 
They  hoped,  somewhat  vainly  as  the  sequel  showed,  that 
they  could  carry  conviction  in  a  public  address. 
Christopher  Holder,  "  moved  of  the  Lord,"  as  Bishop  tells 
us,  rose  on  Sunday  morning,  in  Salem  Meeting  (2ist  Sep 
tember  1657)  "after  the  priest  had  done,"  to  speak  a  few- 
words  in  the  line  of  the  latter's  "  message."  Speaking  in 
public  after  the  minister  had  finished  was  a  common 
practice  and  a  recognised  privilege  in  Puritan  times, 
but  it  was  a  bold  proceeding  for  a  Quaker  to  under 
take  in  the  home  town  of  Endicott !  He  had  hardly 
started  when  he  was  seized  by  the  hair  and  "  his  mouth 
violently  stopped  with  a  glove  and  handkerchief  thrust 
thereinto  with  much  fury  by  one  of  the  church  members, 
a  commissioner." 2 

The  two  visitors  were  taken  to  Boston  on  Monday  and 
there  received  thirty  stripes  apiece  with  a  three-cord 
knotted  whip,  which  cut  their  flesh  so  cruelly  that  a  woman 
spectator  (for  such  things  were  done  in  public)  fell  in  a 
faint.  They  were  then  put  in  a  bare  cell,  with  no  bedding, 
and  kept  three  days  and  nights  without  food  or  drink, 
and  in  addition  were  imprisoned  nine  weeks,  in  New 
England  winter  weather,  with  no  fire.  And  by  a  special 
order  of  the  Governor  and  Deputy-Governor,  though  there 
was  no  existing  law  to  give  warrant  for  it,  the  prisoners 
were  severely  whipped  twice  each  week,  the  first  punish 
ment  consisting  of  fifteen  lashes  and  each  successive  one 
being  increased  by  three  lashes.3  As  this  order  was  issued 

1  Norton's  Ensign,  p.  60.  a  New  England  Judged,  p.  50. 

s  The  law  of  I4th  October  1656  provided  that  Quakers  coming  into  the 
jurisdiction  of  Massachusetts  should  be  committed  to  the  house  of  correction  and 
at  their  entrance  should  be  severely  whipped. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  67 

when  two  weeks  of  the  imprisonment  had  passed,  the 
total  number  of  lashes  endured  by  these  long -suffering 
men  at  this  time  would  be  three  hundred  and  fifty-seven  ! 

When  the  glove  and  handkerchief  were  being  thrust 
into  Holder's  mouth,  Samuel  Shattuck,  apparently  one  of 
the  "  dissenting  circle,"  pulled  away  the  hand  of  the 
commissioner  to  keep  Holder  from  being  choked.  He 
was  at  once  arrested  as  a  "  friend  of  Quakers,"  taken  to 
Boston,  and  put  under  bond  not  to  go  to  any  meetings  of 
the  Quakers  and  to  answer  at  the  next  Court.  It  was 
soon  found  that  the  Quaker  visitors  had  been  entertained 
in  the  home  of  Lawrence  and  Cassandra  Southwick,  who 
were  evidently  the  leaders  of  this  little  "  circle  "  in  Salem. 
They,  too,  were  taken  to  Boston.  The  husband  was 
turned  over  to  the  authorities  of  his  Church  to  be  dealt 
with,  but  Cassandra  was  imprisoned  seven  weeks  and 
then  fined  forty  shillings  for  having  in  her  possession  a 
"  paper  on  Truth  and  the  Scriptures "  which  her  guests 
had  written.  This  "  paper "  was  almost  certainly  "  a 
Declaration  of  Faith  and  Exhortation  to  obedience," 
issued  by  Christopher  Holder  and  John  Copeland,  and 
signed  also  by  Richard  Doudney,  who  had  meantime 
found  his  way  into  Massachusetts  and  had  been  arrested 
because  "  his  speech  betrayed  him  "  and  made  his  hearer 
judge  him  a  Quaker  disciple.  He  was  thus  joined  again 
with  his  fellow-travellers  Holder  and  Copeland,  and  was  a 
signer  of  the  "  Declaration  on  Truth  and  the  Scriptures." 

This  is  the  earliest  formal  Declaration  of  Faith  issued 
by  any  of  the  Quaker  messengers  either  in  the  Old  or  the 
New  World.  It  is  a  strikingly  orthodox  document,  and 
approaches  as  nearly  as  possible  to  the  theological  views 
then  in  vogue  in  the  Churches. 

"We  do  believe,"  it  declares,  "in  the  only  true  and  living 
God,  the  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  .  .  .  who  at  sundry 
times  and  in  divers  manners,  spake  in  time  past  to  our  fathers 
by  the  prophets,  but  in  these  last  days  hath  spoken  unto  us  by 
His  Son  .  .  .  the  which  Son  is  that  Jesus  Christ  that  was  born 
of  the  Virgin ;  who  suffered  for  our  offenses,  is  risen  again  for 
our  justification,  and  is  ascended  into  the  highest  heavens  and 
sitteth  at  the  right  hand  of  God  the  Father :  Even  in  Him  do 


68      QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

we  believe,  who  is  the  only  begotten  Son  of  the  Father,  full  of 
grace  and  truth.  And  in  Him  do  we  trust  alone  for  salvation ; 
by  whose  blood  we  are  washed  from  sin.  [We  believe  in]  the 
Holy  Ghost,  the  Spirit  of  Truth  that  proceedeth  from  the  Father 
and  the  Son,  by  which  we  are  sealed  and  adopted  sons  and 
heirs  of  the  Kingdom  of  heaven,  by  which  Spirit  the  Scriptures 
of  Truth  were  given  forth.  .  .  .  The  Scriptures  we  own  to  be 
a  true  declaration  of  the  Father,  Son  and  Spirit,  in  which  is 
declared  what  was  from  the  beginning,  what  was  present  and 
was  to  come." 

The  writers  of  this  document  were  evidently  en 
deavouring  to  disarm  their  theological  opponents  by 
showing  that  they  were  "  sound "  on  the  fundamental 
tenets  of  universal  Christian  belief,  and  they  shrewdly  put 
these  points  of  agreement  in  the  foreground  of  their 
Declaration,  and  only  at  the  end  of  the  paper  touched 
upon  their  own  peculiar  doctrine  of  "  the  Light  which 
showeth  you  the  secrets  of  your  hearts  and  the  deeds 
that  are  not  good."  "  While  you  have  the  Light,"  they 
say  in  conclusion,  "  believe  in  the  Light  that  you  may  be 
children  of  the  Light,  for,  as  you  love  it  and  obey  it,  it 
will  lead  you  to  repentance,  bring  you  to  know  Him  in 
Whom  is  remission  of  sins.  .  .  .  This  is  the  desire  of  our 
souls  for  all  that  have  the  least  breathing  after  God,  that 
they  may  come  to  know  Him  in  deed  and  truth  and  find 
His  power  in  them  and  with  them." * 

If  this  Declaration  was  prepared,  as  appears,  to  be  a 
conciliatory  document  and  to  quiet  the  opposition,  it  was 
a  complete  failure.  Another  paper,  written  "  against  the 
persecuting  spirit,  with  a  warning  against  those  who 
indulge  in  it" — a  paper  no  longer  extant — was  issued 
about  the  same  time  by  the  three  Friends,  and  was 
peculiarly  resented  by  the  ministers  of  the  Colony.  In 
fact  it  was  the  discovery  of  that  paper  which  brought  the 
extra  lashes,  before  mentioned,  on  the  prisoners  in  the 
Boston  jail.  But  even  the  possession  of  the  conciliatory 
document  proved  a  criminal  offence  in  the  case  of 
Cassandra  Southwick,  for,  as  we  have  seen,  she  was  kept 

1  This  Declaration  was  first  brought  to  light  by  Goold  Brown  the  grammarian, 
and  is  printed  in  full  in  Bowden  i.  91-92. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  69 

seven  weeks  a  prisoner  and  was  fined  forty  shillings  "  for 
having  and  owning  to  the  truth  of  the  Paper  the  strangers 
had  written." 

The  Southwicks,  "  a  grave  and  aged  couple,"  together 
with  some  of  their  friends,  revolting  from  this  spirit  of 
persecution,  now  withdrew  entirely  from  the  Church 
services  in  Salem,  and  met  on  "  First-days  "  in  each  others' 
houses  for  "  quiet  waiting  on  the  Lord." l  The  Southwicks 
were  apprehended,  catechised  on  "the  sufficiency  of  the 
Light  within,"  which  they  admitted,  and  were  put  in  the 
House  of  Correction.  They  were  thereafter  constantly 
harried  and  fined  to  the  verge  of  poverty,  and  finally 
banished  from  the  Colony.  After  their  banishment  two 
of  their  children,  Daniel  and  Provided,  having  no  estates 
to  cover  their  fines,  were  ordered  to  be  sold  into  slavery, 
though  no  shipmaster  could  be  found  to  execute  the  order.2 

The  Christian  spirit  of  these  Salem  Quakers  comes 
out  beautifully  in  a  Letter  which  they  wrote  from  their 
prison  in  Boston  : 

"  For  our  part,  we  have  true  peace  and  rest  in  the  Lord  in 
all  our  sufferings,  and  are  made  willing  in  the  Power  and  Strength 
of  God,  freely  to  offer  up  our  lives,  in  this  cause  of  God  for 
which  we  suffer,  yea,  and  we  do  find,  through  Grace,  the 
enlargement  of  God  in  our  imprisoned  estate,  to  Whom  alone  we 
commit  ourselves  and  families,  for  the  disposing  of  us  according 
to  His  infinite  wisdom  and  pleasure,  in  whose  Love  is  our  Rest 
and  Life."* 

It  is  evident  that  the  converts  to  Quakerism  in  the  New 

1  Besides  the  Southwicks  and  Samuel  Shattuck,  Joshua  Buffum  and  wife  and 
son  Joseph,  John  Small,  John  Burton,  Edward  Harnet,  Nicholas  Phelps  (whose 
home  was  in  Ipswich),  Edward  Wharton,  Samuel  Gaskin,  John  Daniels,  Joseph 
Pope  and  wife,  Anthony  Needham  and  wife,  George  Gardner,  Thomas  Bracket, 
Henry  Trask  and  wife  belonged  to  this  Salem  circle  (see  Annals  of  Salem  ii. 
399  and  New  England  Judged,  pp.  56-64).      Besse  also  speaks  of  twelve  persons, 
unnamed,  who  were  fined  for  not  attending  Church  and  presumably  joining  with 
Friends. — Besse  ii.  188. 

2  The  details  of  the  attempted  sale  of  the  two  Southwick  children  are  given  in 
Besse  ii.    197  and  in  New  England  Judged,   pp.    107-112.      Whittier  has  told 
the   incident  in  his    "Cassandra   Southwick."      The   order  to  sell    Daniel   and 
Provided  Southwick  "  to  any  of  the  English  nation  at  Virginia  or  Barbadoes"  is 
in  the  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  366. 

3  There  is  ground  for  a  suspicion  that  Cassandra  Soutbwick  and  some  others 
of  the  Salem  group  were  inclined  to  adopt  extreme  ascetic  views  regarding  the 
marriage  relation.     She  seems  to  have  held  the  opinion  that  to  have  children 
after    the    flesh   was   to   fall  from    the   higher   life  in  the   Spirit.      See  Joseph 


70     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

World  immediately  rose  to  the  heroic  spirit  and  the  complete 
confidence  in  God  and  their  Cause  which  characterized 
the  Quaker  "  apostles "  who  came  among  them.  After 
the  arrest  of  Holder,  Copeland,  Shattuck,  and  the  South- 
wicks  in  September  1657,  a  new  law  against  Quakers 
was  passed,  I4th  October  1657,  defining  the  punishment 
which  was  to  be  meted  out  to  the  persons  who  are 
called  "  the  cursed  sect  of  Quakers." x  It  inflicted  a 
fine  of  one  hundred  pounds  on  any  one  who  should  bring 
a  Quaker  into  the  Colony ;  forty  shillings  for  every  hour 
that  any  one  should  entertain  or  conceal  a  Quaker,  and  it 
provided  that  any  Quaker  returning  after  having  once 
suffered  should,  if  a  man,  have  an  ear  cropped  ;  for  a 
second  offence  the  other  ear,  and  for  a  third  have  his 
tongue  bored  with  a  hot  iron ;  if  the  offender  was  a 
woman  she  was  to  be  severely  whipped  and  on  the  third 
offence  to  have  her  tongue  bored. 

By  May  of  1658,  the  eleven  who  came  over  in  the 
Woodhouse,  and  in  addition  John  Rous,  William  Leddra, 
and  Thomas  Harris  of  Barbadoes,  and  Mary  Dyer  of 
Rhode  Island,  were  all  at  work  in  New  England.2  Thomas 
Harris  made  his  way  to  Boston,  where  he  was  arrested, 
flogged,  and  imprisoned.  William  Brend  and  William 
Leddra  pushed  on  to  Salem,  where  they  held  a  meeting 
in  the  woods,  but  were  surprised  and  carried  off.  William 
Brend,  though  the  oldest  of  the  band  of  missionaries,  was 
called  to  pass  through  the  most  cruel  sufferings  that  were 
meted  out  in  Boston  to  any  prisoner.  The  tale  is  too 
awful  to  tell  in  detail,  but  the  inhumanity  can  be  judged 
from  the  fact  that  one  incident  in  his  round  of  torture 
consisted  of  one  hundred  and  seventeen  blows  on  his  bare 
back  with  a  tarred  rope.  He  was  found  dying — "  his 
body  having  turned  cold  "  and  "  his  flesh  having  rotted  " 

Nicholson's  Letters  to  Margaret  Fell.  — Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.  107-108. 
Major  Hawthorne  of  Salem  reported  that  he  had  heard  "Consander  Southteck" 
say  that  she  was  greater  than  Moses,  for  Moses  had  seen  God  but  twice,  and 
then  only  His  back  parts,  but  that  she  had  seen  Him  three  times  face  to  face ! — 
Massachusetts  Archives,  vol.  x.  p.  264. 

1  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  398. 

2  In  August  six  of  the  missionaries  left  New  England  for  Barbadoes.     They 
were  William  Leddra,  Thomas  Harris,  William  Brend,  Robert  Hodgson,  Sarah 
Gibbons,  and  Dorothy  Waugh. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  71 

— and  a  physician  was  hurried  in  to  treat  his  mangled 
body  and  implored  to  save  his  life,  for  the  magistrates 
were  now  thoroughly  frightened  by  the  impression  which 
their  brutality  was  making  on  the  citizens  of  Boston. 
John  Norton,  however,  was  still  stout  in  his  remorseless 
attitude,  saying  of  William  Brend :  "  He  endeavoured  to 
beat  the  gospel  ordinances  black  and  blue,  and  it  was  but 
just  to  beat  him  black  and  blue."1^  When  John  Rous 
and  Humphrey  Norton  heard  what  their  aged  friend  was 
passing  through  they  felt  impelled  to  go  to  Boston.  Upon 
their  arrival  they  went  to  hear  John  Norton's  sermon. 
One  could  hardly  expect  them  to  appreciate  it.  Here  is 
John  Rous'  account  of  the  visit  to  the  Church  : 

"  Humphrey  Norton  and  I  were  moved  to  go  into  the  great 
meeting-house  at  Boston  upon  one  of  their  lecture  days,  where 
we  found  John  Norton  their  teacher  set  up,  who,  like  a  babbling 
Pharisee,  ran  over  a  vain  repetition  near  an  hour  long.  When 
his  glass  was  out  he  began  his  sermon,  wherein,  among  many 
lifeless  expressions,  he  spake  much  of  the  danger  of  those  called 
Quakers,  a  flood  of  gall  and  vinegar  instead  of  the  cup  of  cold 
and  refreshing  water !  How  often  hungry  souls  have  been 
deceived  by  him  I  leave  to  that  of  God  in  their  consciences  to 
judge."  2 

Humphrey  Norton  adds  to  the  reader : "  Thou  mayest  see 
the  husks  on  which  the  New  England  priests  feed  their 
flocks ! "  They  were  almost  immediately  arrested, 
imprisoned,  and  flogged.  Rous  has  left  an  account  of  one 
week's  tale  of  suffering  : 

"  On  the  Second-day  (Monday)  they  whipped  six  Friends 
[Salem  colonists  who  had  attended  the  meeting] ;  on  the  Third-day 

1  The  Ensign,  p.  78. 

8  Ensign  p.  55.  The  Magistrates  had  enjoined  Rev.  Mr.  John  Norton  to 
prepare  a  document  ' '  to  manifest  the  evill  of  theire  [the  Quaker]  tenets  and  the 
dainger  of  theire  practices,"  and  to  answer  their  writings  by  which  "divers  of 
weak  capacities  are  deceived. " — Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  i. 
p.  348.  Norton's  "Declaration"  was  published  in  1659  under  the  title  "The 
Heart  of  New  England  Rent  at  the  Blasphemies  of  the  present  Generation."  He 
tries  to  prove  that  the  Quakers  are  offspring  of  the  Miinster  fanatics,  and  he  says  : 
"The  Wolf  which  ventures  over  the  wide  sea,  out  of  a  ravening  desire  to  prey 
upon  the  sheep  ;  when  landed,  discovered,  and  taken  hath  no  cause  to  complain, 
though  for  the  security  of  the  flock  he  be  penned  up,  with  that  door  opening  into 
the  fold  fast  shut,  but  having  another  door  purposely  left  open,  whereby  he  may 
depart  at  his  pleasure,  either  returning  from  whence  he  came,  or  otherwise 
quitting  the  place." 


72     QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

of  the  week  the  gaoler  laid  William  Brend  ....  neck  and  heels, 
as  they  call  it,  in  irons,  as  he  confessed,  for  sixteen  hours ;  and 
on  the  Fourth-day  the  gaoler  gave  W.  B.  117  strokes  with  a 
pitched  rope :  on  the  Fifth-day  they  imprisoned  us,  and  on  the 
Seventh-day  we  suffered.  The  beating  of  W.  B.  did  much  work 
in  the  town,  and  for  a  time  much  liberty  was  granted,  for  several 
people  came  to  us  in  the  prison,  but  the  enemy,  seeing  the  forward 
ness  and  love  in  the  people  towards  us,  plotted,  and  a  warrant 
was  given  forth  that  if  we  would  not  work  we  should  be  whipped 
once  in  every  three  days,  and  the  first  time  have  fifteen  stripes  and 
the  second  time  eighteen,  and  the  third  time  twenty-one.  So 
on  the  Second-day  was  a  se'ennight  after  our  first  whipping,  four 
of  us  received  fifteen  stripes  apiece,  the  which  did  so  work 
with  the  people  that  on  the  Fourth-day  after  we  were  released,  so 
we  returned  to  Rhode  Island." 

In  his  letter  already  quoted,  which  he  dates  "  from 
the  Lion's  den  called  Boston  prison,"  3rd  September 
1658,  John  Rous  gives  a  graphic  review  of  the  work  which 
had  so  far  been  accomplished  in  the  face  of  a  most 
vigorous  and  relentless  persecution  : — 

"  Truth  is  spread  here  above  two  hundred  miles,  and  many 
in  the  land  are  in  fine  conditions,  and  very  sensible  of  the  power 
of  God,  and  walk  honestly  in  their  measures.  And  some  of  the 
inhabitants  of  the  land,  who  are  Friends,  have  been  forth  in  the 
service,  and  they  do  more  grieve  the  enemy  than  we,  for  they 
have  hope  to  be  rid  of  us,  but  they  have  no  hope  to  be  rid  of 
them.  We  keep  the  burden  of  the  service  off  from  them  at 
present,  for  no  sooner  is  there  need  in  a  place,  but  straightway 
some  or  other  of  us  step  to  it,  but,  when  it  is  the  will  of  the 
Father  to  clear  us  of  this  land,  then  will  the  burden  fall  on  them. 
The  Seed  in  Boston  and  Plymouth  Patents  is  ripe,  and  the  weight 
very  much  lies  on  this  town,  the  which  being  brought  into  sub 
jection  to  the  Truth,  the  others  will  not  stand  out  long.  The 
Seed  in  Connecticut  and  Newhaven  Patents  is  not  as  yet  ripe, 
but  there  is  a  hopeful  appearance,  the  gathering  of  which  in  its 
time  will  much  redound  to  the  glory  of  God.  We  have  two 
strong  places  in  this  land,  the  one  at  Newport  in  Rhode  Island, 
and  the  other  at  Sandwich,  which  the  enemy  will  never  get 
dominion  over,  and  at  Salem  there  are  several  pretty  Friends  in 
their  measures.  .  .  .  There  are  Friends,  few  or  more,  almost 
from  one  end  of  the  land  to  the  other  that  is  inhabited  by  the 
English."  i 

1  Letter  of  John  Rous  to  Margaret  Fell,  3rd  September  1658. — Swarthmore 
Collection. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  73 

Sarah  Gibbons  and  Dorothy  Waugh  had,  in  the  early 
spring  of  this  same  year,  accomplished  an  almost  im 
possible  journey.  They  travelled  on  foot  from  Newport 
"  in  great  storms  and  tempests  of  frost  and  snow " — 
what  we  should  call  March  blizzards — all  the  way  to 
Salem.  "  They  lodged  in  the  wilderness  day  and  night — 
through  which  they  cheerfully  passed  to  accomplish  the 
will  and  work  of  God  to  their  appointed  place,  where 
their  message  was  gladly  received." l  They  had  two  weeks 
of  undisturbed  labour  among  those  who  "  gladly  received 
their  message,"  and  then  they  "felt  moved"  to  try 
Boston,  where  they  received  the  usual  barbaric  whipping 
which  "  tore  their  flesh,"  and  they  then  were  allowed  to 
go  away  again  to  Rhode  Island,  which  to  the  Friends  of 
that  period  was  the  "habitation  of  the  hunted-Christ, 
where  we  ever  found  a  place  of  rest  when  weary  we 
have  been." 2 

A  still  more  astonishing  journey  was  made  in  the 
summer  of  1658  by  Josiah  Coale  and  Thomas  Thurston, 
the  latter  of  whom  had  been  in  the  party  of  eight  that 
landed  in  Boston  in  1656.  They  came  over  from 
England  to  Virginia,  where  they  published  their  message, 
and  then  travelled  all  the  way  on  foot  from  Virginia  to  New 
England  "  through  uncouth  passages,  vast  wildernesses, 
uninhabited  countries,  deemed  impassable  for  any  but  the 
Indians."  "  For  outward  sustenance,"  writes  Josiah 
Coale  "  we  knew  not  how  to  supply  ourselves,  but  without 
questioning  or  doubting,  we  gave  up  freely  to  the  Lord, 
knowing  assuredly  that  His  presence  was  with  us ;  and 
according  to  our  faith  so  it  was,  for  His  presence  and  love 
we  found  with  us  daily."3  They  touched  the  hearts  of 
the  wild  Susquehanna  Indians,  who  not  only  gave  them 
"  courteous  entertainment "  but  also  accompanied  them  to 
the  Dutch  Settlement  in  New  Amsterdam  and  nursed 
Thomas  Thurston  through  a  dangerous  illness.  4  Through 
such  hardships  they  came,  because  they  too  felt  "  the  fire 
and  the  hammer  "  in  their  souls.  Josiah  Coale  was  one  of 

1  The  Ensign,  p.  15.  2  The  Ensign,  p.  69. 

8  Josiah  Coale's  Letter  to  George  Bishop. — Bowden,  i.  123. 
4  New  England  Judged,  p.  29  ;  and  Besse  ii.  196. 


74     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

the  finest  spirits  among  the  entire  band  of  "  publishers  of 
Truth"  in  the  colonies.  He  was  born  about  1633,  "of  a 
highly  respectable  family,"  near  Bristol,  and,  like  so  many 
of  his  generation,  he  passed  through  a  deep  travail  of  soul 
before  he  found  peace.  He  had  revolted  in  his  youth  from 
formal  religion,  and  he  nowhere  could  find  anything  which 
answered  to  his  heart's  need.  "  How  to  come  into  the 
way  of  life,"  he  says,  "  I  was  still  a  stranger."  At  length, 
under  the  ministry  of  John  Audland  and  John  Camm  in 
Bristol  in  1654,  he  found  "  the  way  of  life,"  and  gave  him 
self  up  into  God's  service,  to  follow  whithersoever  he  might 
lead.  "  He  baulked  no  danger,"  wrote  William  Penn  of 
him,  "  and  he  counted  nothing  too  dear  for  the  service  of 
his  Lord."  He  possessed  a  rare  and  unusual  gift  in  ministry, 
and  at  his  best  he  powerfully  carried  conviction.  When 
the  occasion  called  for  it  his  speech  was  "  like  an  ax,  a 
hammer,  or  a  sharp  piercing  sword,"  and  then  again  it 
became  "  soft  and  pleasant,  like  streams  of  immortal  life 
running  through  him."  In  prayer  he  was  favoured  with 
surpassing  grace  and  power,  and  often  seemed  transported 
as  he  pleaded  for  the  Light  to  break  upon  souls  who  were 
in  the  dark. l  During  his  brief  period  of  labour  in  New 
England  he  devoted  himself  especially  to  the  Indians  in 
Martha's  Vineyard  and  in  Plymouth  Colony.  He  had 
lived  much  among  the  Indians  on  his  long  journey,  and 
he  had  in  a  peculiar  way  the  key  to  the  Indians'  hearts. 
They  loved  him,  trusted  him,  and  "  had  true  breathings  to 
know  his  God."  As  soon  as  he  turned  from  the  Indians 
"  to  sound  the  day  of  the  Lord  "  among  the  colonists  he 
met  a  different  reception.  He  was  dragged  from  a 
Friend's  house  in  Sandwich  and  was  committed  to  prison, 
where  he  appears  to  have  remained  until  his  departure 
from  the  Colony. 

Christopher  Holder,  John  Copeland,  and  John  Rous 
were  the  first  to  suffer  under  the  law  of  October  1657. 
After  his  release  from  the  terrible  imprisonment  recorded 
above,  Christopher  Holder  took  passage  for  the  West 

1  See  William  Penn's  "Testimony  Concerning  Josiah  Coale,"  Introduction  to 
Coale's  Works  (1671). 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  75 

Indies ;  where  he  probably  spent  the  winter,1  but  he 
continually  felt  "  the  fire  and  the  hammer "  within  him, 
and  was  eager  to  be  back  where  his  friends  were  risking 
their  lives  and  where  he  knew  he  was  needed.  In 
February  1658,  he  sailed  from  Barbadoes  by  way  of 
Bermuda  for  Rhode  Island,  and  after  a  period  of  labour  in 
this  safe  field  he  put  out  again  with  his  old-time  com 
panion,  John  Copeland,  to  face  the  dangers  of  the  stern 
Massachusetts  law.  They  were  arrested  in  August  1658 
in  the  town  of  Dedham  and  brought  before  Governor 
Endicott  in  Boston,  who  said,  "  You  can  be  sure  that  your 
ears  will  be  cut  off."  John  Rous,  who  meantime  had 
been  labouring  in  Rhode  Island,  and  had  returned  to  the 
field  of  danger,  was  seized  about  the  same  time  and  was 
brought  to  trial  with  the  other  two.  "  There  was  a  great 
lamenting  for  me  by  many  when  I  came  again,"  he  says, 
"  but  they  were  not  minded  by  me.  I  was  much  tempted 
to  say  I  came  to  the  town  to  take  shipping  to  go  to 
Barbadoes,  but  I  could  not  deny  Him  who  moved  me  to 
come  hither,  nor  His  service,  to  avoid  sufferings."  After 
a  frivolous  examination  in  theology,  they  were  sentenced 
to  lose  an  ear  apiece. 

Among  those  who  came  to  be  spectators  of  the 
execution  of  this  barbaric  sentence  was  Catherine  Scott 
of  Providence — "  a  grave  and  sober  ancient  woman  of 
good  breeding,  education  and  circumstances,  of  unblame- 
able  conversation." 2  She  was,  as  we  have  seen,  a  sister  of 
Anne  Hutchinson,3  and  had  been  the  first  to  become  a 
Friend  in  Providence,  and  she  had  come  to  Boston  to 
show  her  sympathy  with  the  sufferers.  She  was  the 
mother  of  many  children,  all  of  whom  became  Friends, 
for  as  John  Rous  beautifully  expressed  it,  "  the  power  of 
God  took  place  in  all  her  children."  Her  daughter  Mary 
was  later  to  become  the  wife  of  Christopher  Holder. 
Because  Catherine  Scott  made  too  free  critical  comments 
on  the  execution  of  the  ear-cropping,  she  was  given  ten 
stripes  and  was  told,  in  words  heavy  with  sinister  meaning, 

1  A  letter  from  Peter  Evans  mentions  service  by  Holder  in  St.  Christopher 
and  Nevis  during  the  winter  of  1658. — Swarthmore  Collection,  iii.  no. 

2  New  England  Judged,  p.  94.  3  See  Winthrop  i.  352. 


76     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

that  "  if  she  came  hither  again  there  was  likely  to  be  a 
law  to  hang  her."  Her  brave  answer  was  :  "  If  God  calls 
us,  woe  to  us  if  we  come  not.  I  have  no  question  that 
He  whom  we  love  will  make  us  not  count  our  lives  dear 
unto  ourselves  for  His  name's  sake."  "  We  shall  be  as 
ready  to  take  away  your  lives  as  you  will  be  to  lay  them 
down,"  was  the  ominous  reply  of  Endicott.1 

At  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts,  held  the  I  pth 
of  October  1658,  the  final  step  was  taken  to  end,  if 
possible,  the  "  inroads  "  of  "  this  pernicious  sect."  Whip 
pings,  fines,  ear-croppings,  and  imprisonment  had  proved 
utterly  futile.  Still  the  Quakers  came  just  as  though 
they  were  wanted.  When  John  Rous  and  Humphrey 
Norton  heard  of  William  Brend's  terrible  sufferings,  they 
started  at  once  for  Boston,  as  we  have  seen,  because  they 
could  not  eat  or  sleep  for  their  desire  "  to  bear  their  part 
with  the  prisoners  of  hope,  for  a  testimony  of  Jesus." 2 
What  could  be  done  with  such  men  ?  Neal  was  right 
when  he  said :  "  Such  was  the  enthusiastic  fire  of  the 
Quakers  that  nothing  could  quench  it."  8 

The  only  thing  left  to  be  tried  was  the  penalty  of  last 
resort — death.  The  clergy  of  the  Colony,  especially  John 
Norton,  must  be  held  primarily  responsible  for  this 
extreme  law  of  i658.4  It  was  passed  with  much 
difficulty,  and  was  carried  in  the  House  of  Deputies  by  a 
majority  of  only  one,  and  was  from  the  first  unpopular  in 
general  with  the  lay  citizens.5  The  law,  largely  composed 
of  railing  and  abuse  against  the  Quakers,  contained  this 
clause  :  "  And  the  said  person,  being  convicted  to  be  of 
the  sect  of  the  Quakers,  shall  be  sentenced  to  banishment, 
upon  pain  of  death"  6  It  was  now  to  be  settled  whether 
anything  could  "  quench  their  enthusiastic  fire." 

1  New  England  Judged,  p.  95.  2  Ensign,  p.  79. 

8  Neal,  History  of  New  England,  i.  306.          4  See  New  England  Judged,  p.  86. 

5  A  few  citizens  were  in  favour  of  stern  measures.     See  Petition  in  Massa 
chusetts  Archives,  x.  246. 

6  This  law  is  to  be  found  in  full  in  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv. 
part  i.  p.  345.     The  first  official  recommendation  of  the  death  penalty  was  made 
at  the  meeting  of  the  Federal  Commissioners  of  the  United  Colonies,  held  in 
Boston  in  the  autumn  of  1658,  with  Endicott  presiding.     A  resolution  was  passed 
denouncing  the  Quakers  as  blasphemers,  and  recommending  the  several  colonies, 
which  they  represented,  to  pass  laws  making  it  a  capital  offence  for  banished 
Quakers  to  return. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  77 

The  native  leaders  of  the  Salem  group  were  the  first 
to  receive  sentence  under  the  capital  law.  After  two 
years  of  almost  constant  persecution,  the  chief  members 
of  the  new  society  were  banished  from  the  jurisdiction  of 
Massachusetts  by  Order  of  the  General  Court  held  the 
nth  of  May  1659.* 

Lawrence  and  Cassandra  Southwick  found  their  way 
to  Shelter  Island,  near  the  eastern  end  of  Long  Island, 
which  was  a  safe  refuge  for  persecuted  Friends,  for  it  was 
owned  and  governed  by  Nathaniel  Sylvester,  a  Friend. 
Here  they  peacefully  lived  in  their  new-found  faith  for 
a  brief  period,  and  quietly  finished  their  earthly  course. 
Joshua  Buffum,  another  of  the  group,  moved  to  Rhode 
Island,  while  Samuel  Shattuck,  Nicholas  Phelps,  and 
Josiah  Southwick  made  their  way  to  England  through 
Barbadoes.  They  appear  to  have  landed  in  Bristol  in 
February  1660,  where  they  found  themselves  once  more 
in  a  storm  centre  of  persecution.  William  Dewsbury  has 
given  us  a  vivid  picture  of  the  scene.  On  the  7th  of 
February  a  meeting  was  held  at  the  house  of  Edward 
Pyott  in  Bristol  while  a  great  mob  filled  the  streets 
around,  storming  to  break  up  the  meeting  which,  in  spite 
of  the  noise  and  fury,  was  "  precious  in  the  life  of  the 
Lord  who  filled  His  tabernacle  with  His  glory  in  which 
Friends  parted  with  joy  in  the  Lord."  In  the  evening 
the  mob  attacked  the  house  in  which  the  banished 
Friends  were  staying,  and  where  William  Dewsbury  was 
spending  the  evening  with  them.  The  news  had  just 
arrived  of  the  martyrdom  of  William  Robinson  and 
Marmaduke  Stephenson  (soon  to  be  recounted),  and  the 
little  group  of  Friends  were  sitting  bowed  with  grief 
while  the  mob  raged  outside.  Dewsbury  says  : 

"  We  were  bowed  down  before  our  God,  and  prayer  was  made 
unto  Him,  when  they  knocked  at  the  door.  It  came  upon  my 
spirit  it  were  the  rude  people,  and  the  Life  of  God  did  mightily 
arise,  and  they  had  no  power  to  come  in  till  we  were  clear  before 
our  God.  Then  they  came  in  setting  the  house  about  with 
muskets  and  lighted  matches,  so  after  a  season  of  time  they 

1  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  voL  iv.  part  i.  p.  367.     See  also  ibid.  p.  349. 


78     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

came  into  the  room  where  I  was,  and  Amor  Stoddard  with  me : 
I  looked  upon  them  when  they  came  into  the  room  [and]  they 
cried  as  fast  as  they  could  well  speak,  '  we  will  be  civil,  we  will 
be  civil.'  I  spake  these  words,  '  see  that  you  be  so.'  They  run 
forth  of  the  room  and  came  no  more  into  it  but  run  up  and 
down  in  the  house  with  their  weapons  in  their  hands,  and  the 
Lord  God,  who  is  the  God  of  His  seed  .  .  .  caused  their  hearts 
to  fail  and  they  pass[ed]  away,  and  not  any  harm  done  to  any 
of  us."1 

The  next  day  the  Friends  visited  George  Bishop, 
whose  home  was  in  Bristol,  making  their  way  through  the 
mob  who  were  "  struck  at  their  hearts  by  the  majesty  of 
God  and  stood  gazing  upon  us."  One  can  easily  imagine 
the  author  of  New  England  Judged  seizing  this  opportunity 
to  get  at  first  hand  the  details  of  the  sufferings  of  which 
he  was  to  be  the  historian. 

For  a  brief  time  there  was  a  solemn  pause  before  the 
Massachusetts  law  was  put  to  a  supreme  test,  but  there  were 
heroic  spirits  quite  ready  for  the  worst  the  law  could  do. 
Every  Friend  in  the  ministry  in  America  had  undoubtedly 
read  and  had  been  moved  by  George  Fox's  remarkable 
Epistle  written  from  Launceston  Prison,  an  Epistle  which 
shows  in  the  writer  the  highest  marks  of  spiritual  leader 
ship  : 

"  Let  all  nations  hear  the  sound  by  word  or  writing.  Spare  no 
place,  spare  no  tongue  nor  pen,  but  be  obedient  to  the  Lord  God ; 
go  through  the  work :  be  valiant  for  the  truth  upon  earth ;  and 
tread  and  trample  upon  all  that  is  contrary.  .  .  .  The  ministers 
of  the  Spirit  must  minister  to  the  spirit  that  is  in  prison,  which 
hath  been  in  captivity  in  every  one,  that  with  the  Spirit  of  Christ 
people  may  be  led  out  of  captivity  up  to  God,  the  Father  of 
spirits,  [may]  do  service  to  him,  and  have  unity  with  him,  with 
the  scriptures  and  one  with  another.  ...  Be  patterns,  be 
examples  in  all  countries,  places,  islands,  nations,  wherever  you 
come,  that  your  carriage  and  life  may  preach  among  all  sorts  of 
people,  and  to  them ;  then  you  will  come  to  walk  cheerfully  over 
the  world,  answering  that  of  God  in  every  one." 2 

The  unconquerable  spirit  of  the  leader  had  infused  itself 

1  Letter  of  Dewsbury  to  Margaret  Fell  (Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.  134) ;   and 
Letter  of  A.  Parker  to  Margaret  Fell  (Swarthmore  Collection,  i.  169).     The  date 
of  Dewsbury's  letter  is  fixed  by  internal  evidence. 

2  Journal,  i.  315. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  79 

into  the  entire  band  of  "  publishers,"  and  they  were  sure  in 
the  end  to  defeat  the  law  makers.  In  September  1659 
William  Robinson,  Marmaduke  Stephenson,  Mary  Dyer, 
and  a  little  girl  of  eleven  years,  named  Patience  Scott, 
daughter  of  Richard  and  Catherine  Scott  of  Providence, 
were  apprehended  as  Quakers.  This  child  of  eleven  had 
come  on  foot  from  Providence,  under  a  definite  "  moving 
of  the  Lord,"  as  she  believed,  "  to  bear  her  testimony 
against  the  persecuting  spirit."  William  Robinson  was  a 
Woodhouse  voyager.  Marmaduke  Stephenson  was  a 
Yorkshire  farmer  who  was  on  a  religious  mission  in 
Barbadoes  when  he  heard  of  "  the  law  to  put  the  servants 
of  the  living  God  to  death,"  and  he  heard  within  himself 
"  the  word  of  the  Lord,  saying  '  Go  to  Boston.' " l  He 
was  one  of  a  party  of  eight  Friends  who  at  this  crisis 
formed  a  second  apostolic  expedition  to  the  American 
colonies.2  Mary  Dyer  was  the  wife  of  William  Dyer  of 
Newport,  and  a  type  of  person  whose  fire  was  not  likely 
to  be  quenched  by  the  terror  of  statutes  !  Nicholas  Davis 
of  Plymouth  Colony  had  come  to  Boston  on  business 
about  the  same  time  and,  being  a  Quaker,  was  caught  in 
the  same  drag-net.  The  little  girl  from  Providence  proved 
mighty  in  her  childish  wisdom,  and  "  confounded  the 
lawyers  and  doctors,"  but  she  was  declared  to  have  "  an 
unclean  spirit "  and  was  turned  over  to  her  family  as  too 
young  to  come  under  the  law.  The  other  four  were 
banished  "on  pain  of  death  the  I2th  of  September 
1659."  Nicholas  Davis  returned  home,  and  so,  too,  for 
the  moment  did  Mary  Dyer.  The  other  two  started 
directly  for  Salem  and  went  about  the  work  to  which 
they  felt  called,  travelling  as  far  as  New  Hampshire. 
The  same  day  Christopher  Holder  was  seized  in  Boston, 

1  Letter  from  Boston  prison,  in  New  England  Judged,  p.  133. 

2  See  letters  of  Henry  Fell,  Peter  Pearson,  Robert  Malins,  Peter  Cowsnocke, 
and  Philip  Rose  in  the  Swarthmore  Collection.      Peter  Cowsnocke  was  from  the 
Isle  of  Man,  and  with   Philip   Rose  and  Edward  Teddes,   both  Warwickshire 
Friends,  seems  to  have  been  lost  at  sea  on  the  passage  from  Barbadoes  to  Rhode 
Island.     (Henry  Fell  to   Fox,    Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.    182  ;    Nicholson   to 
Margaret   Fell,    3rd  April   1660,    Swarthmore  Collection,   iv.    107 :    and  record 
cited  in  William  White's  Friends  in  Warwickshire,  p.  23).     Henry  Fell,  Robert 
Malins  from  Bandon,  Ireland,  Ann  Cleaton,  Marmaduke  Stephenson,  and  Peter 
Pearson,  another  Yorkshireman,  were  the  other  five  of  the  party. 


8o     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

when  on  his  way  to  England,  was  kept  in  prison  two 
months,  and  then  banished  "  on  pain  of  death."  l 

While  he  was  still  in  prison,  Mary  Dyer  came  to 
Boston  in  company  with  Mary  Scott  and  Hope  Clifton 
of  Providence,  and  five  days  later  William  Robinson  and 
Marmaduke  Stephenson,  having  returned  from  their 
eastern  journey,  were  apprehended.  With  these  men 
there  were  a  number  of  other  Friends  who  had  been 
"  convinced,"  and  who  came  up  with  them  to  Boston, 
"  moved  of  the  Lord,"  as  the  old  account  has  it,  "  to  look 
your  bloody  laws  in  the  face  and  to  accompany  those 
who  should  suffer  by  them."2 

In  this  strange  group  of  volunteers  were  Daniel  Gould 
of  Newport,  Robert  Harper  of  Sandwich,  William  King, 
Hannah  Phelps,  Mary  Trask,  Provided  Southwick,  and 
Margaret  Smith  of  "  the  first  fruits  "  of  Salem,  and  Alice 
Cowland,  who  brought  linen  with  her  to  wrap  the  dead 
bodies  of  those  who  were  to  be  martyred  ! 8 

It  is  easy  for  us,  at  this  comfortable  distance,  in  an 
ordered  society  in  which  one  believes  what  he  wants  to 
believe — or  peradventure  believes  nothing  at  all — to  say 
that  these  Friends  walked  of  their  own  accord  into  the 
lion's  den,  that  they  knew  the  teeth  of  this  new  law  would 
bite,  and  that  they  should  have  remained  in  safe  territory. 
That  is  undoubtedly  true,  but  it  indicates  a  superficial 
acquaintance  with  the  spirit  of  these  Quakers.  There  are 
persons,  or  at  least  there  once  were,  who  find  all  their 
life-values  altered  and  all  their  utilitarian  calculations 
shifted  by  an  inner  impulsion  which  says  irresistibly, 
"  thou  must !  "  These  Friends  loved  their  lives  and  their 
homes  as  much  as  others  did — they  would  have  preferred 

1  The  death  sentence  is  to  be  executed  ' '  in  case  he  be  found  within  this 
jurisdiction  three  daies  after  the  next  shipp  now  bound  thence  to  England  be 
departed  from  this  harbor." — Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.   iv.   part  i. 

P-  39i- 

2  New  England  Judged,  p.   119.      William  Robinson  in  a  letter  to  George 
Fox  says  :   "  The  Lord  did  lay  it  upon  me  to  try  their  law." 

*  These  Friends  were  confined  for  two  months  and  were  then  sentenced  to 
receive  the  following  punishments :  Daniel  Gould  thirty  lashes  ;  Robert  Harper 
and  William  King  fifteen  each ;  Margaret  Smith,  Mary  Trask,  and  Provided 
Southwick  ten  each.  Alice  Cowland,  Hannah  Phelps,  Mary  Scott,  and  Hope 
Clifton  were  ' '  delivered  over  to  the  Governor  to  be  admonished. ' ' 


CH.  iv  THE   MARTYRS  81 

the  life  of  comfort  to  the  hard  prison  and  the  gallows 
rope  if  they  could  have  taken  the  line  of  least  resistance 
with  inward  peace,  but  that  was  impossible  to  them. 
They  were  as  sensitive  to  the  call  of  duty  as  the  musician 
is  to  the  power  of  harmony ;  they  could  no  more  ignore 
what  seemed  to  them  "  the  movings  of  the  Lord  "  than  a 
creator  of  beauty  can  ignore  the  laws  of  his  art.  They 
were  not  gifted  with  psychological  analysis,  and  they  did 
not  raise  the  question  whether  these  "  calls  "  and  "  mov 
ings  "  were  due  to  "auto-suggestion,"  or  were  actually 
from  the  mouth  of  God.  They  had  learned  to  obey  the 
visions  which  they  believed  were  heavenly,  and  they  had 
grown  accustomed  to  go  straight  ahead  where  the  Voice, 
which  they  believed  to  be  Divine,  called  them. 

They  were  commissioned  to  plant  the  truth  in  Massa 
chusetts,  and  they  "  could  not  do  otherwise  "  in  this  crisis 
than  go  up  and  "  look  the  law  in  the  face."  Their  course, 
I  admit,  was  not  "  rational,"  in  the  narrow  sense  of 
rational,  but  the  great  life  of  loyalty  and  sacrifice  never 
runs  in  any  narrow  groove  of  "  pure "  rationality.  It 
cannot  be  explained  and  plumbed  by  utilitarian  formulae, 
for  life  is  always  richer  than  any  crystallised  rules  and 
concepts  about  it ;  but  it  turns  out  in  the  sweeps  of 
history  that  to  die  for  a  truth,  to  be  loyal  to  vision  even 
on  the  gallows,  is  as  rational  a  course  as  that  of  the 
compromiser  who  saves  his  neck  and  puts  up  with  half  a 
truth  ! 

In  any  case  there  can  be  no  question  that  these 
banished  Quakers  who  came  back  believed  that  they  were 
"  moved "  to  do  so,  and  were  convinced  in  their  minds 
that  the  God  who  led  them  into  danger  would  use  their 
deaths  to  advance  the  truth  more  than  their  lives  could 
advance  it.  It  was  plainly  in  this  faith  that  they  came. 

Here  is  William  Robinson's  testimony : 

"On  the  8th  day  of  the  8th  Month,  1659,  in  the  after  part 
of  the  day,  in  Travelling  betwixt  Newport  in  Rhode  Island  and 
Daniel  Gould's  house,  with  my  dear  Brother,  Christopher  Holder, 
the  Word  of  the  Lord  came  expressly  to  me,  which  did  fill  me 
immediately  with  Life  and  Power,  and  heavenly  Love,  by  which 

G 


82     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

he  constrained  me,  and  commanded  me  to  pass  to  the  Town  of 
Boston,  to  lay  down  my  life,  in  his  Will,  for  the  Accomplishing 
of  His  Service,  which  He  had  to  be  performed  at  the  Day 
appointed.  To  which  heavenly  voice  I  presently  yielded 
Obedience,  not  questioning  the  Lord  how  He  would  bring 
the  Thing  to  pass,  since  I  was  a  Child,  and  Obedience  was 
Demanded  of  me  by  the  Lord,  who  filled  me  with  living 
Strength  and  Power  from  His  heavenly  Presence,  which  at  that 
time  did  mightily  Overshadow  me,  and  my  Life  at  that  time  did 
say  Amen  to  what  the  Lord  required  of  me,  and  had  Commanded 
me  to  do,  and  willingly  was  I  given  up  from  that  time,  to  this 
Day,  to  do  and  perform  the  Will  of  the  Lord,  whatever  became 
of  my  Body;  for  the  Lord  had  said  unto  me,  'thy  Soul  shall 
rest  in  Everlasting  Peace,  and  thy  Life  shall  enter  into  Rest,  for 
being  Obedient  to  the  God  of  thy  life.'  I  was  a  Child,  and 
durst  not  question  the  Lord  in  the  least,  but  rather  was  willing 
to  lay  down  my  Life,  than  to  bring  Dishonour  to  the  Lord ;  and 
as  the  Lord  made  me  willing,  dealing  Gently  and  Kindly  with 
me,  as  a  Tender  Father  by  a  Faithful  Child,  whom  he  dearly 
Loves,  so  the  Lord  did  deal  with  me  in  Ministering  his  Life 
unto  me,  which  gave  and  gives  me  Strength  to  perform  what  the 
Lord  required  of  me ;  and  still  as  I  did  and  do  stand  in  need, 
he  Ministered  and  Ministreth  more  Strength,  and  Virtue,  and 
heavenly  Power  and  Wisdom,  whereby  I  was  and  am  made 
strong  in  God,  not  fearing  what  Man  shall  be  suffered  to  do 
unto  me." l 

Marmaduke  Stephenson's  testimony  is  of  like  import 
and  is  withal  a  beautiful  account  of  a  simple,  guileless 
man's  call  to  stern  duty : 

"In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1655,  I  was  at  the  Plough  in 
the  east  parts  of  Yorkshire  in  Old  England,  near  the  place 
where  my  outward  Being  was,  and  as  I  walked  after  the  Plough, 
I  was  filled  with  the  Love  and  the  Presence  of  the  Living  God 
which  did  Ravish  my  Heart  when  I  felt  it ;  for  it  did  increase 
and  abound  in  me  like  a  Living  Stream,  so  did  the  Love  and 
Life  of  God  run  through  me  like  precious  Ointment,  giving  a 
pleasant  Smell,  which  made  me  stand  still ;  and  as  I  stood  a  little 
still,  with  my  Heart  and  Mind  stayed  on  the  Lord,  the  Word  of 
the  Lord  came  to  me  in  a  still  small  Voice,  which  I  did  hear 
perfectly,  saying  to  me,  in  the  Secret  of  my  Heart  and  Conscience, 
'I  have  Ordained  Thee  a  prophet  unto  the  Nations.'  And  at 

1  Written  in  Boston  Gaol,  igth  of  8th  month,  1659,  in  Bishop's  New  England 
Judged,  pp.  127-129. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  83 

the  hearing  of  the  Word  of  the  Lord  I  was  put  to  a  stand,  being 
that  I  was  but  a  Child  for  a  Weighty  Matter.  So  at  the  time 
appointed,  Barbadoes  was  set  before  me,  unto  which  I  was 
required  of  the  Lord  to  go,  and  leave  my  dear  and  loving  Wife 
and  tender  Children ;  For  the  Lord  said  unto  me  immediately 
by  his  Spirit,  That  he  would  be  a  Husband  to  my  Wife,  and  as 
a  Father  to  my  Children,  and  they  should  not  want  in  my 
Absence,  for  he  would  provide  for  them  when  I  was  gone.  And 
I  believed  that  the  Lord  would  perform  what  he  had  spoken, 
because  I  was  made  willing  to  give  up  myself  to  his  Work  and 
Service  (with  my  dear  Brother),  under  the  Shadow  of  His  Wings, 
who  hath  made  us  willing  to  lay  down  our  Lives  for  His  own 
name  Sake.  So,  in  Obedience  to  the  Living  God,  I  made 
preparation  to  pass  to  Barbadoes  in  the  4th  month,  1658.  So, 
after  some  time,  I  had  been  on  the  said  Island  in  the  Service 
of  God,  I  heard  that  New  England  had  made  a  Law  to  put  the 
Servants  of  the  Living  God  to  death,  if  they  returned  after  they 
were  sentenced  away,  which  did  come  near  to  me  at  that  time ; 
and  as  I  considered  the  Thing,  and  pondered  it  in  my  Heart, 
immediately  came  the  Word  of  the  Lord  unto  me,  saying,  Thou 
knowest  not  but  that  thou  mayst  go  thither.  But  I  kept  this 
Word  in  my  Heart,  and  did  not  declare  it  to  any  until  the  time 
Appointed.  So,  after  that,  a  Vessel  was  made  ready  for  Rhode 
Island,  which  I  passed  in.  So,  after  a  little  time  that  I  had 
been  there,  visiting  the  Seed  which  the  Lord  hath  Blessed,  the 
Word  of  the  Lord  came  unto  me,  saying,  Go  to  Boston,  with 
thy  Brother,  William  Robinson.  And  at  His  Command  I  was 
Obedient,  and  gave  up  myself  to  do  His  Will,  that  so  His  Work 
and  Service  may  be  accomplished;  For,  he  had  said  to  me, 
That  he  had  a  great  Work  for  me  to  do;  which  is  now  come 
to  pass :  And  for  yielding  Obedience  to,  and  obeying  the  Voice 
and  Command  of  the  Everlasting  God,  which  created  Heaven 
and  Earth,  and  the  Fountains  of  Waters,  Do  I,  with  my  dear 
Brother,  suffer  outward  Bonds  near  unto  Death.  And  this  is 
given  forth  to  be  upon  Record,  that  all  people  may  know,  who 
hear  it,  That  we  came  not  in  our  own  Wills,  but  in  the  Will  of  God. 
Given  forth  by  me,  who  am  known  to  Men  by  the  name  of 

MARMADUKE  STEPHENSON, 
But  who  have  a  new  Name  given  me,  which 

the  World  knows  not  of,  written  in  the 

book  of  Life.1 

Written  in  Boston-prison 

in  the  8th  Month,  1659." 

1  New  England  Judged,  pp.  131-133. 


84     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Mary  Dyer  wrote  in  a  similar  strain  : 

"  I  am  by  many  charged  with  the  guiltiness  of  my  own  blood, 
in  my  coming  to  Boston.  But  I  am  therein  clear  and  justified 
by  the  Lord  in  whose  will  I  came.  ...  I  have  no  self -ends,  the 
Lord  knoweth,  for  if  my  life  were  freely  granted  by  you,  it  would 
not  avail  me,  so  long  as  I  should  daily  hear  or  see  the  sufferings 
of  these  people,  my  dear  brethren  and  seed,  with  whom  my  life 
is  bound  up,  as  I  have  done  these  two  years.  ...  It  is  not  my 
own  life  I  seek  (for  I  choose  rather  to  suffer  with  the  people  of 
God  than  to  enjoy  the  pleasures  of  Egypt)  but  the  Life  of  the 
seed  which  I  know  the  Lord  hath  blessed.  .  .  .  Do  you  think 
you  can  restrain  those  whom  you  call  '  cursed  Quakers '  from 
coming  among  you,  by  anything  you  can  do  to  them  !  God 
hath  a  Seed  here  among  you  for  whom  we  have  suffered  and  yet 
suffer  and  the  Lord  of  the  harvest  will  send  more  laborers 
to  gather  this  seed.  In  love  and  in  the  spirit  of  meekness, 

MARY  DYER."  l 

These  three  were  brought  before  the  General  Court  on 
the  1 9th  of  October  and  asked  why  they  had  come. 
"  In  obedience  to  the  call  of  the  Lord,"  was  their  answer. 
Governor  Endicott  was  plainly  embarrassed,  and,  hesitat 
ing  to  take  the  final  step,  he  sent  the  prisoners  back  to 
the  jail.  The  next  day  after  the  morning  sermon  which 
had  called  loudly  for  extreme  measures  with  this  "  cursed 
sect," 2  the  prisoners  were  called  and  given  this  sentence  : 
"  Hearken,  you  shall  be  led  back  to  the  place  from  whence 
you  came  and  from  thence  to  the  place  of  execution,  to 
be  hanged  on  the  gallows  till  you  are  dead."  "  The  will 
of  the  Lord  be  done,"  was  Mary  Dyer's  response.  "  Take 
her  away,  Marshall,"  called  the  Governor.  "  Yea,  joyfully 
shall  I  go,"  answered  the  unmoved  woman.8 

The  execution  was  set  for  the  27th.  As  the  time 
approached  the  thoughtful  people,  those  who  loved  free 
dom  and  had  suffered  in  Old  England  for  their  own  bold 
views,  began  to  revolt  in  spirit  against  the  violence  and 
cruelty  about  to  be  enacted.  Many  were  "  amazed  and 

1  New  England  Judged,  pp.  288-291.  a  Ibid.  p.  120. 

8  The  death  sentence  of  these  three  Friends  is  given  in  Records  of  Massachusetts 
Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  383.  The  court  ordered  ' '  That  the  Rev.  Mr.  Zackery 
Simes  and  Mr.  John  Norton  repair  to  the  prison  and  tender  their  endeavours  to 
make  the  prisoners  sensible  of  their  approaching  danger  and  prepare  them  for 
their  approaching  end." — Ibid.  p.  383. 


CH.-IV  THE  MARTYRS  85 

wondered,"  in  the  quaint  language  of  the  day,  "  the  thing 
struck  among  them."  A  multitude  of  citizens  flocked 
about  the  prison  on  the  morning  of  the  execution,  and 
"  William  Robinson  put  his  head  out  of  his  window 
and  spoke  to  the  people  concerning  the  things  of  God," 
and  they  listened  with  serious  attention.1  An  officer 
endeavoured  to  disperse  the  crowd,  but  finding  that  he 
was  unable  to  do  it,  he  rushed  to  the  prison  "  in  a  fret 
and  heat,  furiously  hurling  some  of  us  down  stairs,  and 
shut  us  up  in  a  low  dark  'cub'  where  we  could  not  see 
the  people." 2  Then  there  breaks  out  this  fine  account  of 
the  last  moments  together,  written  by  one  who  was  in 
the  company : 

"  Shut  up  in  this  dark  and  solitary  place  we  sat  waiting  upon 
the  Lord.  It  was  a  time  of  Love,  for  though  the  world  hated  us 
and  despitefully  used  us,  yet  the  Lord  was  pleased  in  a  wonder 
ful  manner  to  manifest  His  supporting  Love  and  kindness  to  us 
in  our  innocent  suffering.  And  especially  the  two  Worthies 
[Robinson  and  Stephenson]  who  had  near  finished  their  course 
'bore  themselves  with  a  heavenly  cheerfulness  and  they  spake 
many  sweet  and  heavenly  sayings  of  comfort."  3 

Lest  the  victims  might  speak  and  stir  up  the  people 
again,  drums  were  beat  as  they  marched  to  the  gallows. 
They  did  try  to  speak,  but  the  drums  made  such  a  din 
that  the  people  heard  only  the  words,  "  This  is  the  day  of 
your  visitation."  But  their  faces  spoke  in  spite  of  the 
drums,  for  "  glorious  signs  of  heavenly  joy  and  gladness 
were  beheld  in  their  countenances."  They  walked  hand 
in  hand,  with  Mary  Dyer  in  the  middle.  "  Are  you  not 
ashamed  to  walk  thus  between  two  young  men  ?  "  asked 
the  coarse  official.  "  No,"  replied  the  exalted  woman, 
"  this  is  to  me  the  hour  of  the  greatest  joy  I  ever  had  in 
this  world.  No  ear  can  hear,  nor  tongue  can  utter  and 
no  heart  can  understand  the  sweet  incomes  and  the 
refreshings  of  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  which  I  now  feel." 4 

The  doomed  men,  on  the  steps  of  the  gallows,  gave  their 
last  brief  call  to  the  people  to  follow  the  Light  of  Christ, 

1   "  Daniel  Gould's  Narrative"  in  New  England  Judged,  p.  476.     Gould  was 
a  fellow- prisoner.  2  Ibid.  p.  476. 

8  Gould's  Narrative,  ibid.  pp.  476-477.  *  New  England  Judged,  p.  134. 


86     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

and  the  two  men  sealed  their  faith  with  their  lives.  At 
the  last  moment  Mary  Dyer,  her  arms  and  legs  already 
bound  and  her  face  covered  with  a  handkerchief,  loaned 
for  the  purpose  by  her  old  pastor  of  the  Boston  Church, 
the  Rev.  Mr.  Wilson,  was  "  reprieved."  The  sudden 
"  reprieve  "  of  Mary  Dyer  was  in  reality  a  piece  of  acting  : 
there  had  been  no  intention  of  actually  hanging  her. 
John  Winthrop,  Jr.,  Governor  of  Connecticut,  had  pleaded 
with  the  magistrates  of  Boston,  "  as  on  his  bare  knees," 
not  to  hang  the  Quakers  ;  Governor  Temple  of  Acadia 
and  Nova  Scotia  had  offered  to  take  them  away  from 
Massachusetts  and  to  provide  for  them  at  his  own 
expense  ;  finally  Mary  Dyer's  son,  William  Dyer,  had 
begged  for  his  mother's  life. 

Under  these  circumstances  the  Court  decided  not  to 
hang  the  condemned  woman.  The  Colonial  Records  for 
1 8th  October  1659  contain  this  order: 

"  It  is  ordered  that  the  said  Mary  Dyer  shall  have  liberty  for 
forty-eight  hours  to  depart  out  of  this  Jurisdiction,  after  which 
time,  being  found  therein,  she  is  to  be  forthwith  executed  And 
it  is  further  ordered  that  she  shall  be  carried  to  the  place  of  execution 
and  there  to  stand  upon  the  Gallows  with  a  rope  about  her  neck 
until  the  Rest  be  executed ;  and  then  to  return  to  the  prison  and 
remain  as  aforesaid."  x 

She  stubbornly  refused  to  accept  her  life,  if  the  law 
was  still  to  remain  against  "the  suffering  seed."  She 
was,  however,  set  on  horseback  and  carried  away  toward 
Rhode  Island.  After  a  short  stay  at  home,  she  went  on 
a  religious  visit  to  Shelter  Island  in  Long  Island  Sound. 
We  get  one  glimpse  of  her  from  John  Taylor,  who  was 
labouring  in  Shelter  Island  at  the  time  of  this  visit.  He 
says  : 

"One  who  came  to  Shelter  Island  was  Mary  Dyer.  She 
was  a  comly  woman  and  a  grave  matron  and  even  shined  in  the 
Image  of  God.  We  had  several  brave  meetings  there  together 
and  the  Lord's  power  and  presence  was  with  us  gloriously."  2 

But  "  the  fire  and  hammer "  were  in  her  soul  and  she 

1  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  iv.  part  i.  p.  384. 
2  Memoir  of  John  Taylor,  p.  21. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  87 

could  not  stay  away  from  "  the  bloody  town  of  her  sad 
and  heavy  experience." 

"  She  said,"  John  Taylor  tells  us,  "  that  she  must  go 
and  desire  the  repeal  of  that  wicked  law  against  God's 
people  and  offer  up  her  life  there."  She  arrived  in 
Boston  the  2 1st  of  May  1660.  "Are  you  the  same 
Mary  Dyer  that  was  here  before  ?  "  asked  Endicott.  "  I 
am  the  same."  "  You  will  own  yourself  a  Quaker,  will 
you  not  ?  "  "  I  own  myself  to  be  reproachfully  so  called." 
Then  followed  the  expected  sentence.1  "  This  is  no  more 
than  what  thou  saidst  before."  "  But  now,"  said  the 
Governor,  "  it  is  to  be  executed."  "  I  came,"  she  said 
solemnly,  "  in  obedience  to  the  will  of  God  at  your  last 
General  Court,  desiring  you  to  repeal  your  unrighteous 
laws  of  banishment  on  pain  of  death  ;  and  that  same  is 
my  word  now,  and  earnest  request,  although  I  told  you 
that  if  you  refused  to  repeal  them,  the  Lord  would  send 
others  of  His  servants  to  witness  against  them." 

Her  husband,  one  of  the  foremost  citizens  of  Rhode 
Island  and  a  founder  of  the  Aquidneck  Colony,  pleaded  for 
his  wife's  life.2  She  was  offered  her  life,  as  she  stood  on 
the  ladder  of  the  gallows,  if  she  would  return  home.  "  Nay 
I  cannot,"  was  her  firm  answer.  "In  obedience  to  the 
will  of  the  Lord  God  I  came  and  in  His  will  I  abide 
faithful  to  death,"  She  was  asked  if  she  would  like  one 
of  the  Elders  to  pray  for  her,  and  she  answered  in  the 
simplicity  of  her  spirit,  "  Nay,  first  a  child,  then  a  young 
man,  then  a  strong  man  before  an  Elder,"  and  then  with 
words  about  her  "  eternal  happiness "  she  went  to  meet 
the  Saviour  "  in  whose  image  she  shined "  even  here 
below. 3 

The  only  other  capital  execution  was  that  of  William 
Leddra  of  Barbadoes 4 — a  strange  place,  we  should  think 
to-day,  to  furnish  to  the  city  of  Boston  a  martyr  for 

1  The  sentence  is  given  in  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  419. 
a  See  William  Dyer's  letter  to  Governor  Endicott  in  Roger's  Mary  Dyer,  pp. 

94-97- 

*  John  Taylor's  testimony  is :  "  She  has  gone  into  Eternal  life  and  glory 
forever." — Op.  cit.  p.  22. 

4  He  was  a  native  of  Cornwall,  England,  but  had  for  some  time  made  his 
home  in  Barbadoes,  where  he  had  been  an  "  approved  minister." 


88     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES     BK.  i 

spiritual  religion.  He  had  already,  like  his  aged  friend 
William  Brend,  suffered  almost  unspeakable  torture  from 
whippings  and  hard  prison  experiences — "  in  the  bloody 
den,"  as  Bishop  calls  it — and  had  been  banished  on 
pain  of  death.  He  returned  and  was  re-imprisoned  in 
December  1660.  He  was  chained  to  a  log  of  wood  and 
kept  all  winter  in  "  the  miserable  cold  "  of  an  unheated 
prison.  The  charges  against  him  were  sympathy  with 
those  who  had  been  executed,  refusal  to  remove  his  hat, 
his  use  of  thee  and  thou — in  fact,  the  crime  of  being  a 
Quaker.  When  he  saw  that  he  was  to  be  sentenced  under 
the  Act  of  October  1658,  he  appealed  as  an  English  subject 
for  a  trial  under  the  laws  of  England,  but  his  appeal  was 
refused.  He  was  then  urged  to  recant,  and  was  promised  his 
life  if  he  would  "  conform."  "  What,"  he  answered,  "  act  so 
that  every  man  who  meets  me  would  say,  'this  is  the  man 
that  has  forsaken  the  God  of  his  salvation  ! ' '  Remaining 
unshaken,  he  was  sentenced  to  death,  the  date  set  for  the 
execution  being  the  I4th  of  March.1 

He  died  in  the  same  triumphant  spirit  which 
characterised  his  companions  in  martyrdom. 

"  I  testify,"  he  wrote  shortly  before  his  death,  "  in  the  fear  of 
the  Lord  and  witness  with  a  trembling  pen,  that  the  noise  of  the 
whip  on  my  back,  all  the  imprisonments,  and  banishments  on 
pain  of  death,  and  the  loud  threatenings  of  a  halter  did  no  more 
affright  me,  through  the  strength  and  power  of  God,  than  if  they 
had  threatened  to  bind  a  spider's  web  to  my  finger.  ...  I  desire, 
as  far  as  the  Lord  draws  me,  to  follow  my  forefathers  and  brethren 
in  suffering  and  in  joy.  My  spirit  waits  and  worships  at  the 
feet  of  Immanuel."2 

On  the  day  before  he  went  to  death,  he  wrote  a 
beautiful  and  tender  letter  to  "  the  Little  Flock  of  Christ," 
in  which  he  said  : 

"The  sweet  influences  of  the  Morning  Star,  like  a  flood, 
distilling  into  my  habitation  [a  dark  cold  room,  "little  larger 
than  a  saw-pit,"  where  he  was  still  chained  to  a  log]  have  so 
filled  me  with  the  joy  of  the  Lord  in  the  beauty  of  holiness 
that  my  spirit  is  as  if  it  did  not  inhabit  a  tabernacle  of  clay,  but 

1  New  England  Judged,  p.  317.  a  Ibid.  pp.  296-297. 


CH.  iv  THE  MARTYRS  89 

is  wholly  swallowed  up  in  the  bosom  of  eternity  from  whence  it 
had  its  beginning.  ...  As  the  flowing  of  the  ocean  doth  fill 
every  creek  and  branch  and  then  retires  again  toward  its  own 
being  and  fulness,  leaving  a  savour  behind,  so  doth  the  Life  and 
Power  of  God  flow  into  our  hearts  making  us  partakers  of  His 
Divine  Nature,  therefore  let  this  Life  alone  be  your  joy  and 
consolation."  x 

He  died  as  a  martyr  should,  in  calm  faith,  with  noble 
bearing.  The  spectators  bore  witness  that  "  the  Lord  did 
mightily  appear  in  the  man." 2 

As  Mary  Dyer's  lifeless  body  hung  from  the  gallows 
and  swung  in  the  wind  Humphrey  Atherton  of  Boston 
pointed  to  it  and  said  in  jest — "She  hangs  there  as  a  flag  !  " 
Like  many  things  said  in  jest  on  historic  occasions,  the 
word  was  literally  true.  She  did  hang  as  a  flag — she  was 
a  sign  and  a  symbol  of  a  deathless  loyalty — and  it  was  a 
sign  which  the  wayfaring  man  could  read.  Her  death 
showed,  as  did  also  the  deaths  of  the  other  martyrs,  that, 
whether  right  or  wrong  in  their  fundamental  beliefs,  a 
people  had  come  to  these  shores  who  were  not  to  be  turned 
aside  by  any  dangers  or  terrors  which  mortal  man  could 
devise,  who  were  pledged  to  loyalty  to  the  voice  of  God 
in  their  souls  and  ready  to  follow  it,  even  though  it  took 
them  to  the  hardest  suffering  and  death.  Every  martyr 
was,  thus,  in  truth  a  flag. 

1  An  "  Epistle  to  the  Society  of  the  Little  Flock  of  Christ,"  in  New  England 
Judged,  pp.  299-302. 

8  From  a  letter  written  by  Thomas  Wilkie  of  Barbadoes. — Bowden's  History, 

i-  3i5- 

Joseph  and  Jane  Nicholson  of  Cumberland,  England,  fell  under  the  provisions 
of  the  capital  law  and  they  were  in  prison  in  irons  when  Mary  Dyer  was  hung,  but 
for  some  reason — for  fear  that  their  execution  would  excite  the  common  people  of 
Boston,  Joseph  Nicholson  says — they  were  allowed  to  go  free.  Joseph  Nicholson 
wrote  The  Standard  of  the  Lord  lifted  up  in  New  England,  London,  1660. 

Edward  Wharton  of  Salem  was  fellow-prisoner  with  William  Leddra  through 
all  his  last  imprisonment  and  barely  escaped  with  his  life.  For  saying  that  Robinson 
and  Stephenson  were  wickedly  killed  and  that  the  guilt  of  their  blood  was  greater 
than  he  could  bear,  he  was  whipped  with  twenty  lashes  and  fined  twenty  pounds. 
Early  in  the  year  1660  he  was  arrested  in  his  house  for  being  a  Quaker  and  brought 
before  Governor  Endicott.  He  was  kept  nearly  a  year  in  prison,  through  the 
winter,  being  in  the  same  ' '  cub  "  with  William  Leddra,  and  at  the  Court  which 
sentenced  Leddra  to  death,  Wharton  was  banished  on  pain  of  death,  and  given 
ten  days  to  leave  the  jurisdiction.  He  stayed  in  Boston  and  attended  his  friend  to 
the  gallows  and  caught  his  lifeless  body  as  it  fell  from  the  scaffold,  and  with  three 
other  brave  Friends  he  gave  the  body  burial.  He  then  went  quietly  to  his  home 
and  wrote  to  the  authorities  of  Boston  that  he  was  there  and  expected  to  stay 
there  ! — New  England  Judged,  pp.  315-325  and  p.  342.  Besse,  ii.  220-221. 


CHAPTER    V 

THE    KING'S    MISSIVE 

WHILE  these  Friends  were  thus  joyously  dedicating  their 
lives  to  purchase  freedom  to  worship  God,  and  to  win  the 
privilege  of  holding  the  faith  which  to  their  souls  seemed 
true  and  spiritual,  their  fellow-believers  in  England  were 
putting  forth  every  exertion  in  their  power  to  stop  "  the 
vein  of  innocent  blood  "  which  was  flowing  in  Boston. 

George  Fox,  an  extraordinarily  sensitive,  sympathetic, 
and  even  telepathic  person,  had  been  deeply  moved  by  the 
sufferings  of  those  who  were  in  some  measure  his  disciples. 
He  says  : 

"When  those  were  put  to  death  (in  New  England)  I  was  in 
prison  at  Lancaster,  and  I  had  a  perfect  sense  of  their  sufferings 
as  though  it  had  been  myself,  and  as  though  the  halter  had  been 
put  about  my  own  neck,  though  we  had  not  at  that  time  heard 
of  if."1 

Christopher  Holder  and  his  companions,  John  Copeland 
and  John  Rous,  were  now  in  England,  visible  "  witnesses," 
with  their  cropped  ears,  of  the  way  the  bearers  of  the 
gospel  of  inward  Light  were  treated  in  the  Puritan 
Colony.  Samuel  Shattuck,  Josiah  Southwick,  and 
Nicholas  Phelps  of  Salem,  banished  from  their  home  for 
espousing  the  cause  of  the  Quakers,  were  also  in  England 
bearing  their  testimony.  In  1659  Humphrey  Norton 
told  his  powerful  story  of  suffering  and  wrongs.2  This 
was  followed  in  1660  by  The  Standard  of  the  Lord 

1  Fox's  Journal,  i.  507.  Fox  is  probably  incorrect  here  in  regard  to  the  date 
of  his  experience.  News  of  the  martyrdom  of  Robinson  and  Stephenson  reached 
England  in  February  1660  (see  Dewsbury's  account  and  A.  Parker's  letter  to 
Margaret  Fell,  Swarthmore  Collection,  i.  169),  while  Fox  was  not  imprisoned  in 
Lancaster  until  May  1660.  *  The  New  England  Ensign. 

90 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  91 

lifted  up  in  New  England,  written  by  Joseph  Nicholson, 
who  with  his  wife  had  extensively  laboured  and  greatly 
suffered  in  New  England  ;  and  the  next  year  came  the 
first  edition  of  George  Bishop's  book,  packed  with  an 
array  of  atrocious  persecutions — his  New  England  Judged, 
a  copy  of  which  King  Charles  II.  read.  It  is  said  that 
the  King  was  reading  in  Bishop's  book  the  account  of  a 
Friend's  appeal  from  the  cruel  course  of  the  Colony  to 
the  privileges  of  the  laws  of  England,  and  came  upon 
Major-General  Denison's  slighting  remark  on  authority 
and  procedure  in  England.  Denison,  it  seems,  had  met 
the  Quakers'  claim  of  a  right  to  appeal  to  the  English 
government  for  justice  with  the  scoffing  remark  that  it 
would  do  no  good  if  they  did.  "  This  year,"  he  said, 
"you  will  go  and  complain  to  Parliament,  and  the  next 
year  they  will  send  out  to  see  how  it  is,  and  the  third 
year  the  government  will  be  changed ! " J  i.e.  nothing  will 
be  done.  The  King  was  deeply  impressed  by  this 
passage,  and  noted  the  difference  between  this  language 
and  the  humble  tone  of  the  address  from  New  England 
on  the  occasion  of  his  accession.  He  called  his  courtiers 
and  read  the  passage  to  them,  and  added :  "  Lo,  these 
are  my  good  subjects  of  New  England,  but  I  will  put  a 
stop  to  them  ! " 2  In  addition  came  a  very  concrete  list 
of  sufferings  which  was  presented  to  the  King  in  the  form 
of  a  Petition  signed  by  the  men  who  had  been  banished 
from  Massachusetts.  The  list  contained  the  following 
items : 

1.  Two  honest  and  innocent  women   stripped  stark  naked 
and  searched  in  an  inhuman  manner. 

2.  Twelve  strangers  in   that   country,  but  freeborn   of  this 
nation,  received  twenty-three  whippings,  most  of  them  with  a 
whip  of  three  cords  with  knots  at  the  ends. 

3.  Eighteen    inhabitants    of    the    country,    being    freeborn 
English,  received  twenty-three  whippings. 

4.  Sixty-four  imprisonments  "  of  the  Lord's  people,"  amount 
ing  to  five  hundred  and  nineteen  weeks. 

5.  Two  beaten  with  pitched  ropes,  the  blows  amounting  to 
an  hundred  and  thirty-nine. 

1  New  England  Judged,  p.  82.  2  Sewel's  History,  i.  492. 


92     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

6.  An  innocent  old  man  banished  from  his  wife  and  children, 
and  for  returning  put  in  prison  for  above  a  year. 

7.  Twenty-five  banished  upon  penalties  of  being  whipped,  or 
having  their  ears  cut,  or  a  hand  branded. 

8.  Fines,  amounting  to  a  thousand  pounds,  laid   upon   the 
inhabitants  for  meeting  together. 

9.  Five  kept  fifteen  days  without  food. 

10.  One  laid  neck  and  heels  in  irons  for  sixteen  hours. 

11.  One  very  deeply  burnt  in  the  right  hand  with  an  H  after 
he  had  been  beaten  with  thirty  stripes. 

12.  One  chained  to  a  log  of  wood  for  the  most  part  of  twenty 
days  in  winter  time. 

13.  Five  appeals  to  England  denied. 

14.  Three  had  their  right  ears  cropped  off. 

15.  One   inhabitant  of  Salem,  since  banished   on  pain   of 
death,  had  one-half  of  his  house  and  land  seized. 

1 6.  Two  ordered  sold  as  bond-servants. 

1 7.  Eighteen   of  the  people   of  God  banished  on   pain   of 
death. 

1 8.  Three  of  the  servants  of  God  put  to  death.1 

19.  Since   the   executions   four  more  banished  on   pain   of 
death  and  twenty-four  heavily  fined  for  meeting  to  worship  God.2 

To  offset  these  vivid  portrayals  of  wrongs  endured, 
the  authorities  in  Massachusetts  presented  their  side  of 
the  case.  They  had  sent  a  Petition  to  King  Charles, 
soon  after  his  accession,  expressing  their  loyalty  to  his 
government  and  hope  of  his  favour  to  their  Colony. 
"  May  it  please  your  Majesty,"  they  wrote,  "  in  the  day 
you  happily  know  that  you  are  king  over  your  Brittish 
Israel  to  cast  a  favourable  eye  upon  your  poore 
Mehibboseth,"  i.e.  Massachusetts  Colony.  In  this  address 
they  took  occasion  to  defend  themselves  for  their  treat 
ment  of  the  Quakers,  by  making  the  latter  out  to  be  a 
type  of  persons  not  fit  to  live  on  the  earth.  "  They  are 
open  blasphemers,"  the  address  says,  "open  seducers 
from  the  glorious  Trinity,  the  Lord's  Christ,  the  blessed 
gospel,  and  from  the  Holy  Scriptures  as  the  rule  of  life. 
They  are  open  enemies  to  the  government  itself  as 
established  in  the  hand  of  any  but  men  of  their  own 
principles.  They  are  malignant  promoters  of  doctrines 

1  William  Leddra  was  executed  after  this  was  written. 
2  Besse's  Sufferings,  \.  pp.  xxx. -xxxi. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  93 

directly  tending  to  subvert  both  our  church  and  state."  1 
In  addition  to  this  Petition  to  the  King  the  Court  of 
Massachusetts  sent  an  address  to  Parliament  and  instruc 
tions  to  its  London  Agent,  Leverett,  to  do  his  utmost  to 
prevent  an  action  which  would  tie  the  hands  of  the 
colonial  authorities  from  acting  in  their  own  way  with  the 
Quakers.2  Richard  Bellingham  also  wrote  a  pamphlet 
setting  forth  the  necessity  of  suppressing  the  Quakers. 
"  There  is  more  danger,"  he  declared,  "  in  this  People  to- 
trouble  and  overcome  England  than  in  the  King  of  the 
Scotts  and  the  Popish  Princes  of  Germany."  8 

After  serious  consultation  among  Friends  in  England 
it  was  decided  to  lay  the  Quaker  sufferings  before  the 
Privy  Council,  and  it  was  arranged  for  Edward  Burrough 
to  prepare  an  Address  to  the  King — "  Some  Considera 
tions,"  it  is  modestly  called — presenting  the  true  situation 
and  urging  him  to  use  his  power  to  stop  the  persecution 
now  going  on  in  his  Colony.  He  refutes  point  by  point 
the  charges  in  the  "  Petition  and  Address  of  the  General 
Court "  of  Massachusetts.  He  denies  that  Quakers  have 
ever  been  "  impetuous  or  turbulent,"  that  they  have  ever 
"  lifted  up  a  hand  or  made  a  turbulent  gesture "  against 
any  authority  either  in  Church  or  State,  or  that  they  have 
ever  been  "  found  with  a  carnal  weapon  about  them,"  or 
that  they  had  committed  any  crime,  "  saving,  that  they 
warned  sinners  to  repent."  Those  who  have  gone  to 
death  in  the  Colony  have  been  "  martyred  for  the  name 
of  Christ,"  solely  for  a  "  difference  in  judgment  and 
practice  concerning  spiritual  things."  He  insists  that  these 
sufferers  went  to  New  England  because  they  were  "  moved 
of  the  Holy  Spirit"  to  go,  and  that  those  who  have  died 
there  have  died  "  for  a  good  conscience  " — which  was  the 
simple  truth. 

When  the  news  of  William  Leddra's  execution  reached 

1  Printed  in   Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,   vol.   iv.  part  i.  pp.  450-453. 
Quoted  also  in  Edward  Burrough's  ' '  Some  Considerations  Presented  unto  the  King 
of  England  Being  an  Answer  unto  a  Petition  and  Address  of  the  General  Court  of 
Boston  in  New  England."      Works  of  Edward  Burrough  (London,   1672)  pp. 
756-763. 

2  Hutchinson  Collection,  p.  329. 

8  Quoted  in  Howgil's  Popish  Inquisition,  Works,  p.  259. 


94     QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

the  Friends  in  England,  Edward  Burrough  sought  an 
interview  in  person  with  the  King.  He  said  to  the 
King,  "  There  is  a  vein  of  innocent  blood  opened  in  thy 
dominions  which  will  run  over  all,  if  it  is  not  stopped." 
To  which  the  King  at  once  replied,  "  but  I  will  stop  that 
vein."  "  Then  stop  it  speedily,"  said  Burrough,  "  for  we 
know  not  how  many  may  soon  be  put  to  death."  "  As 
speedily  as  ye  will.  Call  the  Secretary  and  I  will  do  it 
presently."1  The  secretary  came  and  a  mandamus  was 
prepared  on  the  spot.  Edward  Burrough  pressed  that  it 
be  despatched  with  haste.  "  But  I  have  no  occasion  at 
present  to  send  a  ship  thither,"  answered  the  King.  "  If 
you  care  to  send  one  you  may  do  it,"  and  he  gave  Burrough 
the  privilege  of  naming  the  messenger  to  carry  the  man 
damus.  Burrough  at  once  named  Samuel  Shattuck,  the 
Salem  Quaker  who  had  been  banished  from  the  Colony 
on  pain  of  death  !  and  the  King  appointed  him  as  his 
royal  messenger. 

The  Friends  then  chartered  a  ship  of  Ralph  Goldsmith, 
himself  a  Quaker,  and  agreed  with  him  for  three  hundred 
pounds  to  sail  in  ten  days  for  Boston  with  the  King's 
messenger  and  missive.2 

The  colonists  were  warned  in  advance  by  the  colonial 
agent,  Leverett,  that  the  Quakers  had  brought  their 
grievances  to  the  notice  of  the  King,  and  there  was  an 
ominous  impression  in  the  minds  of  many  that  they  had 
much  to  fear  from  the  new  sovereign,  who  was  known  to 
have  no  sympathy  with  the  theological  or  political  ideals 
which  were  the  very  pillars  of  the  New  England  common 
wealth.  It  seemed  wisest  to  bow  somewhat  to  the 
threatening  storm,  and  so  an  order  was  issued  by  the 
colonial  authorities,  permitting  all  Quakers  then  in  prison 
"  to  depart  and  go  for  England." 3  This  order  released 
twenty-seven  Quakers  who  were  at  the  time  in  Boston 
prison,  most  of  whom  were  "  convinced  "  colonists,  though 
the  list  included  some  newly  arrived  Quaker  "  publishers  "  : 
Elizabeth  Hooton,  Joan  Brocksoppe,  Mary  Mallins, 

1  See  Sewel's  History,  i.  473. 

2  This  account  is  taken  from  Fox's  Journal,  i.  507-509. 

8  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  i.  p.  433. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  95 

Catherine  Chattam,  and  John  Burstow  and  Peter  Pearson, 
who  had  already  done  extensive  missionary  work  in  the 
Colonies. 

Meantime  another  Friend  was  being  doomed  to  death 
and  was  in  imminent  danger  of  execution.  This  was 
Wenlock  Christison.  His  origin  and  antecedent  history 
are  unknown.  He  suddenly  appears  in  New  England 
leaving  no  clear  trail  behind  him.  He  always  claims  to 
be  a  British  subject  and  he  once  directly  implies  that 
he  has  come  from  England.  Harrison,  in  his  valuable 
monograph,!  thinks  that  Christison  was  of  Scottish  descent 
and  that  the  blood  of  the  Covenanters  flowed  in  his  veins. 
At  any  rate  he  was  possessed  of  martyr-fibre.  He  first 
comes  to  public  notice  as  one  among  many  Friends  who 
were  thrown  into  prison  in  Boston,  I3th  December  1660. 
He  had  just  come  from  Salem  and  was  evidently  moving 
about  from  place  to  place,  as  the  way  opened  for  him  to 
perform  religious  service.  He  was  arrested,  and  banished 
on  pain  of  death.  After  his  release  he  visited  Plymouth 
Colony,  where  he  was  imprisoned  fourteen  weeks,  in  cold 
winter  weather,  "tied  neck  and  heels  together,"  flogged 
"  with  twenty-seven  cruel  stripes  on  his  naked  body,"  and 
deprived  of  his  Bible  and  clothes — "  waistcoat,  two  other 
coats,  hat  and  bag  of  linen  " — to  the  value  of  four  pounds 
for  prison  fees.  This  was  for  "coming  into  one  Colony 
when  he  was  banished  from  another." 

Being  at  length  released,  he  returned  to  Boston  and 
suddenly  appeared  before  the  Court,  precisely  as  they 
were  pronouncing  sentence  of  death  on  William  Leddra  ! 
The  magistrates  were  "  struck  with  a  great  damp  "  when 
they  saw  another  man  "  unconcerned  for  his  life  come  to 
trample  under  the  law  of  Death."  "  For  a  little  space  of 
time,  there  was  silence  in  the  Court,  but  recovering  from 
the  swoon,  one  of  the  Court  cried  out,  '  Here  is  another, 
fetch  him  to  the  bar.' "  2 

Then  followed  this  dialogue :  "  Is  your  name  Wenlock 
Christison  ?  " 

1  Harrison's  Wenlock  Christison  and  the  Friends  in  Talbot  County,  Maryland 
(Baltimore,  1878),  p.  16. 

2  New  England  Judged,  p.  319. 


96     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

"  Yes." 

"  Wast  not  thou  banished  on  pain  of  death  ?  " 

"  Yes,  I  was." 

"  What  dost  thou  here  then  ? " 

"  I  am  come  to  warn  you,  that  you  shed  no  more 
blood." 

It  was  hoped  that  Leddra's  death  would  awe  him  into 
submission,  and  on  the  day  of  that  Friend's  execution 
Christison  was  given  an  opportunity  to  renounce  his  views 
and  so  save  his  life.  "  Nay,"  was  his  reply,  "  I  shall  not 
change  my  religion,  nor  seek  to  save  my  life.  I  do  not 
intend  to  deny  my  Master,  and  if  I  lose  my  life  for 
Christ's  sake  I  shall  save  it." 

His  brave  manner  and  saintly  bearing  made  a  profound 
impression  on  some  of  the  magistrates,  and  Governor 
Endicott  had  difficulty  in  securing  a  capital  sentence. 
For  two  weeks  there  was  a  stern  division  in  the  Court, 
and  "  a  spirit  of  confusion."  A  determined  minority  stood 
out  against  "  the  bloody  course,"  and  urged  a  change  of 
policy.  Governor  Endicott  was  so  incensed  by  the 
opposition  that  he  struck  his  fist  on  the  table  and 
declared,  "  I  could  find  it  in  my  heart  to  go  back  home  " 
\i.e.  to  England].  "  Record  those  who  will  not  consent — I 
thank  God  I  am  not  afraid  to  give  judgment."  He  then 
pronounced  the  sentence  of  death  to  be  executed  on  I3th 
June  1 66 1.1  Then  the  calm,  unmoved  victim  spoke 
these  solemn  words :  "  The  will  of  the  Lord  be  done. 
In  the  will  of  God  I  came  amongst  you,  and  in  His 
counsel  I  stand,  feeling  His  eternal  power,  that  will  uphold 
me  to  the  last  gasp.  Be  it  known  unto  you  all,  that  if 
you  have  power  to  take  my  life  from  me,  my  soul  will 
enter  into  everlasting  rest  and  peace  with  God  ;  and  if 
you  have  power  to  take  my  life  from  me,  the  which  I 
question,  I  believe,  you  will  never  more  take  Quakers' 
lives  from  them.  Note  my  words :  Do  not  think  to 

1  Richard  Russell  was  one  of  the  magistrates  who  refused  to  give  his  consent 
to  the  prisoner's  death,  and  the  whole  Court  was  much  moved  by  the  receipt  at 
this  very  time  of  Edward  Wharton's  letter  saying  that  though  banished  on  pain 
of  death  he  was  at  his  home  in  Salem  and  intended  to  remain  there,  about  his 
occupation.  See  Besse,  ii.  223,  and  Sewel,  i.  488-490. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S   MISSIVE  97 

weary  out  the  living  God  by  taking  away  the  lives  of  His 
servants.  What  do  you  gain  by  it?  For  the  last  man 
you  put  to  death)  here  are  five  come  in  his  room}  And  if 
you  have  power  to  take  my  life  from  me  God  can  raise  up 
the  same  principle  of  life  in  ten  of  His  servants  and  send 
them  among  you  in  my  room" 

He  was  not  called  upon,  however,  to  suffer  his  penalty, 
and  he  lived  to  see  his  predictions  fulfilled.  Just  before 
the  time  appointed  for  his  hanging  an  order  was  granted 
for  his  release  and  for  the  liberation  of  a  large  number 
of  Friends  as  related  above.  The  release  was  due  to  the 
desire  to  propitiate  those  who  were  using  the  Quaker 
persecution  as  a  ground  for  royal  interference,  for  the 
magistrates  realised  that  only  by  most  delicate  diplomacy 
could  they  preserve  satisfactory  relations  with  the  mother- 
country,  though  they  hardly  suspected  the  humiliation 
which  Goldsmith's  ship  was  bringing  them.2 

Ralph  Goldsmith,  though  buffeted  in  the  early  part  of 
his  voyage  with  heavy  storms,  brought  his  ship  across 
in  six  weeks  and  anchored  in  the  harbour  on  a  "  First- 
day."  The  people  of  the  city  flocked  on  board  to  ask 
for  letters  but  were  told  that  no  letters  would  be  delivered 
on  "  First-day  "  !  They  reported  on  shore  that  the  ship 
was  loaded  with  Quakers,  some  of  them  persons  banished 
on  pain  of  death. 

Samuel  Shattuck  tells  it  in  his  own  quaint  way  as 
follows : 

"When  wee  came  into  Boston  harbour  many  came  on  ship 
board  for  Newes  and  Letters ;  But  were  somewhat  struck  in 
Amaze  when  they  saw  what  wee  were.  When  wee  came  on 
shoar,"  Shattuck  continues,  "  wee  found  all  very  still  and  a  very 
great  calme ;  the  moderate  sort  (as  I  met  them)  Rejoiced  to  see 
me  and  some  of  the  violent  wee  met  as  men  chained  and 
bowed  down  and  could  not  look  us  in  the  face."3 

1  The  five  newly  arrived  "  publishers  of  truth." 

2  There  is  an  entry  in   the   Massachusetts  Colonial  Records  which   appears 
to  be  a  letter  from  Wenlock  Christison  signifying  his  willingness  to  depart  from 
that  jurisdiction  if  he  is  granted  his  freedom,  adding,  "  I  know  not  yt  ever  I 
shall   com   into   it   any  more."      (Massachusetts  Archives,    x.    273).       He  did, 
however,  continue  to  labour  within  that  jurisdiction  and  was  various  times  after 
wards  arrested  and  punished.     (See  New  England  Judged,  pp.  433,   440,   457, 
and  467).  s  Aspinwall  Papers,  part  i.  p.  160. 

H 


98     QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES     BR.  i 

So  they  passed  on  to  the  home  of  the  Governor  and 
asked  for  admission  to  his  presence.  As  they  insisted 
that  they  could  deliver  their  message  only  to  the  Governor 
himself,  they  were  ushered  into  his  presence,  Samuel 
Shattuck  wearing  his  hat.  Endicott  in  anger  ordered 
the  hat  taken  off,  which  was  done  by  a  servant.  Where 
upon  Shattuck  produced  his  credentials  as  a  royal  messenger 
and  showed  the  mandamus.  The  Governor  at  once 
uncovered  and  ordered  the  Quaker's  hat  to  be  given  back 
to  him,  and  then  he  read  the  mandamus  which  was  as 
follows  : 

"  CHARLES  R. 

"  Trusty  and  well-beloved,  we  greet  you  well.  Having  been 
informed  that  several  of  our  subjects  among  you,  called  Quakers, 
have  been  and  are  imprisoned  by  you,  whereof  some  have  been 
executed,  and  others  (as  hath  been  represented  unto  us)  are 
in  danger  to  undergo  the  like ;  we  have  thought  fit  to  signify 
our  pleasure  in  that  behalf  for  the  future,  and  do  hereby  require, 
that  if  there  be  any  of  those  people  called  Quakers  amongst 
you,  now  already  condemned  to  suffer  death  or  other  corporal 
punishment ;  or  that  are  imprisoned,  and  obnoxious  to  the  like 
condemnation,  you  are  to  forbear  to  proceed  any  further  therein ; 
but  that  you  forthwith  send  the  said  persons  (whether  condemned 
or  imprisoned)  over  into  their  own  kingdom  of  England,  together 
with  their  respective  crimes  or  offences  laid  to  their  charge ;  to 
the  end  such  course  may  be  taken  with  them  here  as  shall 
be  agreeable  to  our  laws  and  their  demerits.  And  for  so  doing, 
these  our  letters  shall  be  your  sufficient  warrant  and  discharge. 

"  Given  at  our  Court,  at  Whitehall,  the  9th  day  of  September 
1 66 1,  in  the  i3th  year  of  our  reign. 

"To  our  trusty  and  well-beloved  John  Endicott,  Esq.,  and 
to  all  and  every  other  governor  or  governors  of  our  plantations 
of  New  England,  and  of  all  the  colonies  thereunto  belonging, 
that  now  are,  or  hereafter  shall  be ;  and  to  all  and  every  the 
ministers  and  officers  of  our  plantations  and  colonies  whatsoever, 
within  the  continent  of  New  England. 

"  By  his  Majesty's  command, 

"  WILLIAM  MORRIS."  l 

1  This  incident  is  happily  and  beautifully  told  by  Whittier  in  ' '  The  King's 
Missive."  Whittier's  poem  provoked  severe  criticism  from  the  Rev.  Dr.  George 
E.  Ellis,  on  the  ground  that  the  poem  was  historically  inaccurate,  and  consider 
able  discussion  ensued.  The  substance  of  the  discussion  is  given  in  Pickard's 
John  Greenleaf  Whittier,  pp.  775-785. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  99 

It  was  an  extremely  trying  order  and  a  humiliating 
situation.  To  send  the  prisoners  to  England  was  plainly 
out  of  the  question,  and  the  order  was  imperative  that 
they  should  "  proceed  no  further,"  either  with  death 
sentences  or  with  "  other  corporal  punishment."  "  We 
shall  obey  his  Majesty's  commands,"  was  the  Governor's 
laconic  decision  as  he  turned  to  Samuel  Shattuck,  and 
this  order  was  issued  : 

"  To  William  Salter,  keeper  of  the  prison  at  Boston,  you  are 
requested,  by  authority  and  order  of  the  General  Court,  to  release 
and  discharge  the  Quakers  who  at  present  are  in  your  custody. 
See  that  you  do  not  neglect  this.  By  order  of  the  Court. 

"  EDWARD  RAWSON,  Secretary." 1 

As  a  result  of  this  order  a  large  release  of  prisoners  was 
made,  among  them  the  venerable  Nicholas  Upsall  who 
had  lain  in  the  prison  of  his  own  city  for  two  years. 
John  Chamberlein,  who  had  been  convinced  of  the  Quaker 
truth  at  the  gallows,  when  Robinson  and  Stephenson  were 
executed,  was  also  among  those  who  were  liberated,  and 
the  Friends  gathered  at  his  house  for  their  meeting  of 
rejoicing,  Chamberlein's  house  being  at  this  period  the 
regular  meeting-place  of  the  Friends  in  Boston.  Shattuck's 
letter,  already  quoted  from,  gives  a  fresh  impression  of 
the  joy  and  triumph  which  the  new  turn  of  affairs  brought 
to  the  long-suffering  band  : 

"  The  coming  of  our  ship  is  of  very  wonderfull  service,  for  the 
Bowells  of  the  moderate  sort  are  greatly  refreshed  throughout  the 
Country,  and  many  mouths  are  now  opened,  which  were  before 
shutt  and  some  of  them  now  say,  Its  the  welcomest  ship  that 
ever  came  into  this  Land." 

The  authorities  of  the  Colony  had,  as  we  have  seen, 
anticipated  royal  interposition  and  had  already  changed 
their  policy  of  dealing  with  the  Quakers,  but  none  the 
less  this  "  missive  "  from  the  King  marks  an  epoch  in  the 
history  of  colonial  Puritans.  They  might  congratulate 
Charles  the  Second  and  ask  him  to  "  cast  favourable  eyes 
on  poore  Mehibboseth,"  but  in  their  hearts  they  knew 
that  a  dangerous  turn  of  the  tide  had  set  in,  and  that  the 

1  Eesse,  ii.  226.     Sewel,  i.  492-496. 


zoo    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

enemy  of  their  faith  and  of  their  ideals  was  now  their 
sovereign.  They  no  longer  had  behind  them  the  great 
moral  and  spiritual  England  of  the  Commonwealth,  and 
they  were  never  again  to  have  an  entirely  free  hand  in 
working  out  their  lofty  vision  of  a  New  England,  which 
in  their  dreams  was  to  be  a  New  Jerusalem — a  Republic 
of  the  saints  of  God.  They  had  fought  their  Armageddon 
and  it  was  a  drawn  battle.  It  was  now  unmistakably 
evident  that  the  Colony  must  henceforth  be  shared  with 
these  unwelcome  Quaker  guests.  The  founders  of  it 
had  used  their  extreme  measures  to  keep  the  Colony 
immune  and  they  had  failed.  Their  own  people  were  in 
revolt  against  their  system  of  expulsion  and  extermination, 
they  saw  ten  Quakers  coming  for  every  one  who  was 
killed,  and  now  one  of  these  same  Quakers,  banished  on 
pain  of  death,  had  come  boldly  in  as  the  inviolable 
messenger  of  an  anti-Puritan  king.  "  Give  Mr.  Shattuck 
his  hat ! "  "  The  King's  command  shall  be  obeyed  !  " 
were  two  sentences  which  must  have  cost  brave  old 
Endicott  profound  pain. 

There  was  a  momentary  lull  in  the  storm  of  persecu 
tion,  but  it  was  only  a  temporary  relief  and  no  surrender, 
for  so  long  as  John  Norton  remained  the  guardian  of 
orthodoxy,  and  so  long  as  John  Endicott  was  left  as  the 
representative  embodiment  of  the  Puritan  ideal,  there 
could  be  little  peace  for  the  Quaker,  with  his  claim 
of  an  inward  Light,  even  though  there  were  a  danger 
that  King  Charles  might  occasionally  be  stirred  to  call 
a  halt,  and  to  show  that  he  meant  what  he  said  in  the 
Declaration  of  Breda.1 

On  the  constitutional  point  of  transferring  their 
prisoners  to  England  to  be  tried  the  colonists  did  not 
yield  an  iota,  and  in  the  weighty  deliberations  which 
followed  upon  their  duties  to  the  King  they  showed 
a  good  measure  of  the  spirit  which  swept  through  New 
England  again  more  than  a  hundred  years  later.  They 
declared  that  their  "patent"  was  the  foundation  of  the 

1  ' '  We  do  declare  liberty  to  tender  consciences,  and  that  no  man  shall  be  dis 
quieted  or  called  in  question  for  differences  of  opinion  in  matters  of  religion." 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  101 

rights  of  the  Colony,  and  they  asserted  that  "any  im 
position  prejudicial  to  the  country,  contrary  to  any  just 
laws  of  ours  not  repugnant  to  the  laws  of  England,  is  an 
infringment  of  our  right "  ;  and  they  further  declared  that, 
"  it  may  well  stand  with  the  loyalty  and  obedience  of 
subjects  to  plead  with  their  princes  against  all  such  as 
shall  endeavour  the  violation  of  their  privileges."1  But 
from  this  time  forward  frequent  interferences  occurred 
on  the  part  of  the  King.  It  is  true  that  he  informed 
the  Massachusetts  officials,  through  their  agents,  that 
Parliament  had  made  sharp  laws  against  the  Quakers, 
and  "we  are  content  you  should  do  the  like,"2  but  in 
the  same  letter  the  King  insists  that  all  public  officers  in 
the  Colony  shall  be  chosen  without  reference  to  their 
religious  opinions  and  profession,  and  royal  commissions 
after  this  date  more  than  once  called  a  halt  on  Quaker 
persecution,  as  we  shall  see.  It  is  with  some  humiliation 
that  we  are  compelled  to  thank  Charles  II.  for  the  first  stay 
of  persecution,  since  interferences  by  a  royal  prerogative 
later  endangered  the  colonial  charters  and  attempted  to 
thwart  the  democratic  experiment  of  the  colonists  in  every 
way  possible,  but  the  harried  Quaker  took  his  temporary 
relief  without  much  compunction !  For  the  moment, 
however,  the  relief  was  slight. 

The  old  law  inflicting  banishment  on  pain  of  death 
had  already  been  altered,  before  the  King's  "  missive " 
came,  and  a  new  law  had  been  drawn  up  designed  to  be 
more  effective  and  at  the  same  time  not  so  obnoxious  to 
the  Home  Government,  or  so  revolting  to  the  people. 
This  new  law,  passed  the  22nd  of  May  1661,  was  the 
atrocious  "  Cart  and  Whip  Act."  It  began  with  the 
statement  that  the  Court  was  "  desirous  to  try  all  means, 
with  as  much  lenity  as  may  consist  with  our  safety,  to 
prevent  the  intrusion  of  the  Quakers,"  followed  with  the 
usual  amount  of  vigorous  description  of  the  persons  so 
named.  It  was  then  enacted  that  any  person  "  not  giving 
civil  respect  by  the  usual  gestures,  or  by  any  other  means 

1  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  ii.  p.  35. 
a  Colonial  Papers,  a8th  June  1662. 


102    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

manifesting  himself  to  be  a  Quaker,  shall  ...  be  stripped 
naked  from  the  middle  upwards  and  be  tied  to  a  cart's 
tail  and  whipped  through  the  town,  and  from  thence 
immediately  conveyed  to  the  constable  of  the  next  town, 
towards  the  borders  of  our  jurisdictions,  and  so  from 
constable  to  constable  till  they  be  conveyed  through  any 
of  the  outwardmost  towns  of  our  jurisdiction."  If  "  such 
vagabond  Quaker  "  returns,  he  is  to  be  whipped  out  again, 
and  so  on  for  three  times.  The  fourth  time  he  is  to  be 
branded  on  the  left  shoulder  with  the  letter  R  and 
whipped  out  of  the  Colony.  Then,  if  finally  the  said 
Quaker  proves  to  be  "an  incorrigible  rogue  and  enemy 
of  the  common  peace,"  he  is  to  suffer,  if  there  is  anything 
left  of  him,  under  the  old  law  of  I658.1  Some  of  the 
Friends  who  were  liberated  from  prison  when  the  change 
of  policy  was  initiated,  were  punished  under  this  new  law. 
Peter  Pearson  and  Judith  Brown  were  selected,  among 
the  prisoners  in  custody  when  the  Act  was  passed,  to  be 
the  first  examples  of  its  cruelty.  They  had  both  been 
banished  and  had  returned  "  to  look  the  law  in  the  face," 
and  probably  for  this  reason  they  were  chosen  to  suffer 
at  the  cart-tail.  They  received  twenty  stripes  on  their 
naked  backs  as  they  went  through  Boston  on  their  way 
out  of  the  "  jurisdiction."  All  the  other  Friends  set  free 
at  this  great  "  delivery  "  were  ordered  to  be  driven  out  of 
the  territory  by  a  guard  of  soldiers.  John  Chamberlein 
was  whipped  nine  times  at  the  cart's  tail  "  because  he 
suffered  a  meeting  at  his  house," 2  and  was  liberated  a 
second  time  by  the  King's  missive.  George  Wilson,  also 
a  native  citizen,  was  whipped  with  Chamberlein  through 
three  towns,  the  executioner  using  for  the  purpose  an 
ingeniously  cruel  whip  which  tore  the  flesh  in  barbarous 
fashion.3  Josiah  Southwick  and  Nicholas  Phelps  had 
returned  from  their  banishment  in  the  autumn  of  1661. 
Phelps,  whose  constitution  had  been  undermined  by  what 
he  had  undergone,  died  soon  after  his  arrival.  Southwick, 
with  almost  excessive  Quaker  frankness,  appeared  before 

1  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  ii.  p.  2. 

8  Aspinwall  Papers,  part  i.  p.  161.  *  Besse,  ii.  324. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  103 

the  authorities  and  announced  his  return  to  his  country. 
He  was  apprehended  and  whipped  through  Boston, 
Roxbury,  and  Dedham,  and  then  carried  fifteen  miles 
and  left  in  the  wilderness.  The  next  morning  he 
fearlessly  returned  to  his  home  in  Salem,  having  told 
his  torturers  that  he  "  cared  no  more  for  what  they  could 
do  to  him  than  for  a  feather  blown  in  the  air." l 

The  terrible  "  Cart  and  Whip  Act "  was  re-enacted, 
in  slightly  modified  form,  the  8th  of  October  1662,  and 
under  this  law  some  of  the  most  harrowing  tortures  were 
inflicted.2  Two  instances,  both  of  which  are  historically 
too  important  to  be  omitted,  will  suffice,  and  many  of 
the  details  can  be  spared.  The  first  instance  is  the  case 
of  Alice  Ambrose,  Mary  Tomkins,  and  Ann  Coleman. 

These  three  Friends,  about  whose  earlier  history  little 
is  known,  had  come  from  England,  probably  in  the  summer 
of  1662,  with  a  sense  of  a  call  to  pioneer  service  in  the 
Colonies.  Their  chief  interest  to  us  lies  in  the  fact  that 
they  were  "  the  first  publishers "  of  the  Quaker  message 
in  what  later  came  to  be  a  great  Quaker  centre,  namely, 
the  Piscataqua  region — particularly  the  country  about 
Dover  and  Portsmouth,  New  Hampshire — and  also  in  the 
region  which  they  call  "  the  Province  of  Mayn."  8 

Edward  Wharton,  of  Salem,  one  of  the  foremost  of 
the  native  Quaker  ministers  of  the  early  period,  and 
George  Preston,  also  of  Salem,  with  two  of  the  English 
women,  Alice  Ambrose  and  Mary  Tomkins,  made  their 
way  to  Dover,  and  took  up  their  headquarters  in  an  inn 
there,  where  they  received  many  inquirers,  made  many 
convincements,  and  solidly  established  their  truth  in  the 
minds  of  a  group  of  the  Dover  people,  though  they  came 
into  violent  collision  with  the  ministers  of  the  town, 
especially  with  one  whom  they  call  "  priest  Rayner." 
They  found  here  in  Dover  a  prepared  group  ready  for 
their  views,  much  like  the  groups  which  had  existed  in 

1  New  England  Judged,  p.  356. 

2  Records  of  Massachusetts  Colony,  vol.  iv.  part  ii.  p.  59. 

3  These  women  were  not  actually  the  first  Quaker  missionaries  to  reach  the 
Piscataqua  region,  as  William  Robinson  and  Marmaduke  Stephenson  had  already 
been  there  in  1659  (see  Bishop,  p.  117),  though  we  have  no  details  of  their  work. 


104    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Newport,  Sandwich,  and  Salem.  There  had  come  to  the 
Piscataqua  region,  at  an  earlier  time,  some  who  were 
unwelcome  in  Massachusetts  because  of  their  too  free 
religious  views.  There  were  survivors  of  the  great 
Hutchinson  controversy  still  living  in  the  region,  and 
the  ministry  of  the  famous  Hansard  Knollys,  the  third 
minister  to  come  to  the  Dover  church,  had  led  many  in 
the  direction  of  Anabaptist  ideas.  The  result  was  that 
the  little  band  of  "  publishers  "  left  behind,  as  they  pushed 
farther  eastward,  a  goodly  number  of  believers  in  their 
way  of  life.  From  Dover  they  crossed  over  the  Piscataqua 
river  into  the  Province  of  Maine,  by  invitation  of  Major 
Shapleigh,  a  magistrate  and  leading  citizen  in  the  town 
ship  of  Kittery,  evidently  in  the  part  since  set  off  as  the 
township  of  Eliot.  "  He  was  an  enquiring  man,"  Bishop 
tells  us,1  a  seeker,  and  he  "  kept  a  priest  in  his  house  "  and 
had  a  room  set  apart  for  public  worship.  Under  the 
ministry  of  his  new  guests  he  and  his  wife  were  "  con 
vinced  of  truth,"  and  became  "  obedient "  to  their  new 
light,  and  "  truth  got  great  dominion  in  the  hearts  of  the 
people  there,"  which  means  that  a  Quaker  meeting  was 
begun  in  the  Province  of  Maine.  After  a  thorough 
canvas  of  that  region  the  four  Friends  returned  to 
Massachusetts. 

Later  in  the  year,  as  winter  was  approaching,  the  two 
women,  with  Ann  Coleman  as  companion,  decided  to 
revisit  those  who  had  "  received  the  truth  in  Piscataqua 
river."  They  had  not  been  long  in  Dover  before  the 
magistrates  were  stirred  up  by  one  of  the  ministers — the 
"  priest  Rayner,"  who  had  disputed  with  them  on  the 
former  visit — to  apply  the  "  Cart  and  Whip  Act "  to  the 
visitors.  The  following  order  was  issued  by  a  deputy- 
magistrate  named  Walden : 

"  To  the  constables  of  Dover,  Hampton,  Salisbury,  Newbury, 
Rawley,  Ipswich,  Wenham,  Lynn,  Boston,  Roxbury,  Dedham ; 
and  until  these  vagabond  Quakers  are  carried  out  of  this  jurisdic 
tion.  You  and  every  of  you  are  required,  in  the  King's 
Majesty's  name,  to  take  these  vagabond  Quakers,  Ann  Coleman, 

1  New  England  Judged,  p.  363. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S   MISSIVE  105 

Mary  Tomkins,  Alice  Ambrose,  and  make  them  fast  to  the  cart's 
tail,  and  driving  the  cart  through  your  several  towns,  to  whip 
them  upon  their  backs,  not  exceeding  ten  stripes  apiece  on 
each  of  them,  in  each  town,  and  so  convey  them  from  constable 
to  constable  till  they  come  out  of  the  jurisdiction."1 

It  was  in  the  heart  of  a  northern  winter  when  these 
women  were  stripped  to  the  waist  and  tied  to  the  cart  to 
trudge  under  the  lash  through  these  eleven  towns,  the  snow 
lying  "  half-leg-deep,"  as  they  passed  through  Hampton  ; 
but  we  are  told  that  "the  presence  of  the  Lord  was  so 
with  them,  in  the  extremity  of  their  sufferings,  that  they 
sang  in  the  midst  of  them  to  the  astonishment  of  their 
enemies."2  Deliverance  came  unexpectedly  in  Salisbury, 
for  Walter  Barefoot  asked  to  be  made  deputy-constable, 
and  taking  the  matter  into  his  own  hands  fearlessly  set 
the  women  free.3 

The  women  went  straight  back  toward  Piscataqua 
river,  revisited  Major  Shapleigh  on  the  way,  and  then 
came  into  Dover,  where  they  again  endured  treatment 
too  cruel  and  barbarous  to  be  told  in  detail.4 

The  other  extraordinary  application  of  "  the  Cart  and 
Whip  Act"  is  the  case  of  Elizabeth  Hooton.  She  was 
the  first  woman  "  convinced "  by  Fox's  preaching  in 
England,  and  she  was  the  first  woman  to  manifest  a  gift 
for  public  ministry.  She  went  through  many  dreadful 
persecutions  in  England,  and  finally  laid  down  her  life  in 
the  island  of  Jamaica.5  She  was  at  the  time  of  her  New 
England  suffering  advanced  in  years,  and  had  made  her 

1  This  is  dated  at  Dover,  22nd  December  1662,  and  is  signed  by  Richard 
Walden,  though  Bishop  says  that  ' '  priest  Rayner "  drew  it  up.     When  Alice 
Ambrose  was  asked  her  name  she  said,  "My  name  is  written  in  the  Lamb's 
book  of  Life."      "Nobody  here  knows  that  book,"  answered  Walden. — New 
England  Judged,  p.  366. 

2  New  England  Judged,  p.  367. 

3  Bishop  says  that  John  Wheelwright,  "an  old  priest,"  advised  the  constable 
to  go  on  with  the  whipping,  p.  368. 

4  Besse,  ii.  228.     New  England  Judged,  pp.  370-374. 

8  In  Devonshire  House  Portfolio,  No.  3,  there  are  many  papers  by  Elizabeth 
Hooton,  to  the  priests  about  1651,  to  Cromwell,  to  the  Mayor  of  London,  and  a 
number  to  the  King.  Portfolio  3,  27  gives  her  sufferings  in  New  England  ;  3,  35 
is  a  lamentation  for  Boston  in  New  England  ;  3,  36  a  lamentation  for  Boston  and 
Cambridge  in  New  England  ;  3,  39  a  threatening  letter  to  the  rulers  of  Boston  ; 
3,  40  lays  open  cruelty  in  New  England  at  Boston,  Cambridge,  Salem,  etc.;  also 
3,  42  and  3,  43  ;  3,  45  gives  passages  on  New  England. 


io6    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

way  to  Virginia  from  Barbadoes,  and  had  travelled  all  the 
way  from  Virginia  through  incredible  hardships  to  Boston, 
where  she  was  at  once  thrust  into  prison.  Being  released 
from  prison  she  was  conveyed  to  the  limit  of  the  Colony 
and  left  in  the  wilderness,  making  her  way  as  best  she 
could  to  Rhode  Island.  She  went  from  there  to  Barbadoes 
and  took  ship  again  for  Boston  !  Here  she  was  taken  by 
the  constable  and  put  on  ship  for  Virginia,  and  after 
suffering  for  the  faith  there,  she  returned  to  England,  but 
only  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  out  her  original  plan — 
to  preach  in  New  England ! 

She  now  procured  from  the  King  a  special  license  to 
permit  her  to  build  a  house  in  America,  and  with  the 
King's  document  sailed  for  Boston.  Here  she  applied 
for  liberty  to  build  a  house  for  herself  to  live  in  and  for 
Friends  to  meet  in.  The  privilege  was  stoutly  refused, 
and  this  unwearied  woman  next  started  for  the  Piscataqua 
region. 

At  Hampton  she  was  imprisoned.  At  Dover  she  was 
put  in  the  stocks  and  kept  four  days  in  prison.  Then  she 
made  her  way  back  to  Cambridge,  where  she  was  locked 
up  in  "  a  close,  foul  dungeon,"  and  kept  two  days  and 
nights  without  food  or  drink.  A  Friend,  for  there  were 
by  this  time  convinced  Friends  in  almost  all  the  New 
England  towns,  hearing  of  her  sufferings,  brought  her 
some  milk  for  which  he  was  fined  five  pounds.  An  order 
was  next  issued  for  whipping  this  poor  woman  out  of  the 
jurisdiction,  though  she  showed  the  King's  document 
granting  her  the  privilege  of  owning  a  house  wherever 
she  would  in  the  Colony.  She  was  tied  to  a  post  in 
Cambridge  and  given  ten  lashes  with  a  three  corded 
knotted  whip.  Then  she  was  taken  to  Watertown,  where 
she  received  ten  lashes  more.  On  a  cold,  frosty  morning 
she  was  brought  into  Dedham,  where,  tied  to  a  cart,  the 
tortured  body  had  ten  lashes  more.  Torn  and  bleeding 
after  a  long  day's  journey  she  was  left  at  night  in  the 
woods,  and  by  what  seemed  to  her  friends  a  miraculous 
preservation  she  arrived  next  day  at  the  town  of  Rehoboth 
(now  the  town  of  Seekonk)  and  made  her  way  to  Newport. 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  107 

Notwithstanding  this  usage,  to  us  seemingly  unendur 
able,  Elizabeth  Hooton  returned  to  Cambridge,  where,  after 
being  "  abused  by  a  wicked  crew  of  Cambridge  scholars," 
she  was  whipped  again,  first  in  the  town  of  Cambridge, 
and  then  from  constable  to  constable  through  three 
towns  toward  Rhode  Island.  Again  she  went  back  to 
Boston  and  endeavoured  to  give  her  message.  She  was 
this  time  taken  to  the  House  of  Correction  and  given  ten 
stripes,  and  then  whipped  at  a  cart's  tail  through  Roxbury, 
Dedham,  and  Medfield,  and  left,  at  the  end  of  her  whipping, 
in  the  woods.  She  got  to  a  town  where  there  were 
Friends  who  refreshed  her,  and,  with  indomitable  per 
sistence,  she  went  back  to  Boston  !  She  was  again 
whipped  out  of  the  town  and  threatened  with  death  if  she 
returned.  We  are  told  that  "  her  inward  consolations  did 
so  abound  that  she  was  able  to  bear  all  her  afflictions  in 
holy  triumph,  and  in  humble  meekness  she  declared  that 
she  was  willing,  for  the  love  she  bore  the  souls  of  men, 
to  suffer  all  and  more  for  the  seed's  sake." l 

Whether  this  sort  of  insistent  importunity  be  judged 
holy  boldness  or  fanaticism  will  depend  largely,  I  suppose, 
upon  the  point  of  view — "the  psychological  climate" — 
of  the  person  judging.  This  woman,  it  is  plain,  was 
"  possessed "  with  a  conviction  of  duty,  and  she  believed 
that  the  way  to  break  down  the  odious  laws  and  the 
system  of  enforcing  conformity  was  to  impress  the  public 
with  the  inhuman  character  of  the  system,  and  to  show 
the  magistrates  the  utter  futility  of  the  laws  for  accom 
plishing  their  purpose,  and  she  put  the  law  and  the 
system  to  this  extreme  test.  The  entire  story  of  what 
was  suffered  on  the  tender  bodies  of  men  and  women  in 
the  effort  to  break  down  the  system  of  intolerance  and  to 
secure  free  worship  cannot  be  told  here  in  detail.  I  have 
made  a  complete  list  of  all  the  sufferers  and  what  they 
underwent,  but  it  is  too  bulky  to  print  here. 

1  Besse,  ii.  228-231;  New  England  Judged,  pp.  410-418.  Elizabeth  Hooton 
had  still  further  sufferings  in  Boston,  Salem,  and  Braintree,  and  on  one  occasion 
travelled  on  foot  seventy  miles  to  reach  Rhode  Island.  She  was  in  Boston  at 
the  time  of  Governor  Endicott's  death  and  attended  his  funeral,  where  she 
probably  tried  to  speak  (see  Bowden  i.  259).  She  died  in  the  island  of  Jamaica 
in  1671. 


ro8    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

The  strain  was  in  some  instances  too  great  for  human 
nerves  to  bear,  and  a  few  persons — to  us,  with  our  know 
ledge  of  hysteria,  suggestion,  and  auto-suggestion,  sur 
prisingly  few — lost  their  mental  balance  and  did  things 
which  belong  properly  to  the  list  of  fanatical  acts.  In 
1663  Thomas  Newhouse  entered  a  church,  and  broke 
two  empty  bottles,  crying  out  as  he  did  so  that  thus 
those  who  persecuted  Friends  should  be  dashed  in  pieces. 
Thomas  Newhouse  appears  to  have  been  mentally  un 
settled.  He  became  "  lost  to  truth  "  and  was  disowned 
from  the  Society  of  Friends.1 

In  1 66 1,  Catherine  Chattam,  another  victim  of  harsh 
persecution,  appeared  in  Boston  clothed  in  sackcloth  and 
ashes  as  a  sign  of  troubles  which  the  Lord  would  bring 
upon  that  persecuting  city. 2 

There  are  two  pitiful  cases  of  women  who  were  driven 
over  the  verge  of  sanity  by  the  fury  of  the  persecution 
which  their  families  endured.  The  first  of  these  was 
Lydia  Wardel  of  Hampton.  She  was  "  a  chaste  and 
tender  woman  of  exemplary  modesty,"  but,  harrowed  by 
the  treatment  which  was  inflicted  on  her  husband,  and 
still  more  by  the  stripping  and  scourging  of  women  which 
she  had  seen,  she  felt  driven  to  appear  unclothed  in  the 
congregation  at  Newbury.  She  yielded  to  the  obsession 
and  appeared  as  "  a  naked  sign."  The  poor  woman  should 
have  received  wise  medical  treatment.  Instead,  both  she 
and  her  husband  were  outrageously  whipped. 8 

The  other  case  was  that  of  Deborah  Wilson,  wife  of 
Robert  Wilson  of  Salem  and  sister  of  Joshua  Buffum  and 

1  See  William  Edmundson's  Journal,  p.  61.  Dr.  Ellis  in  his  Massachusetts 
and  its  Early  History,  p.  114,  has  related  how  two  Quaker  women,  Sarah  Gibbons 
and  Dorothy  Waugh,  entered  John  Norton's  church  in  Boston  in  1658,  and  broke 
two  bottles  "  as  a  sign  of  his  emptiness. "  This  incident  is  probably  apocryphal. 
The  two  women  did  enter  the  church  and  "speak  a  few  words,"  whereupon  they 
were  arrested  and  kept  three  days  in  jail  without  food.  (New  England  Judged, 
p.  58. )  None  of  the  early  authorities  mention  the  bottles.  See  interesting  note 
in  Hallowell's  Pioneer  Quakers,  p.  73. 

8  It  must  be  remembered  that  both  the  Puritans  and  the  Friends  were  diligent 
readers  of  the  Hebrew  prophets,  and  they,  especially  the  Friends,  made  much  of 
these  "signs,"  which  the  prophets  often  felt  called  upon  to  "act"  in  person. 
Catherine  Chattam  was  unmercifully  whipped  for  this  "acted  sign,"  and  passed 
through  a  severe  illness  from  the  strain,  but  she  appears  to  have  wholly  recovered. 
She  afterwards  became  the  wife  of  John  Chamberlein  of  Boston. 

8  New  England  Judged,  pp.  376-377 


CH.  v  THE  KING'S  MISSIVE  109 

Margaret  Smith.  She,  overwrought  by  the  sufferings  of 
her  family,  had  a  similar  obsession,  and  felt  constrained 
to  walk  through  the  town  of  Salem  as  "  a  naked  sign."  As 
a  punishment  she  was  tied  to  a  cart  by  the  side  of  her 
mother  and  her  sister  Margaret  Smith,  and  the  three  were 
whipped  through  the  town,  while  her  husband,  "  himself 
not  altogether  of  her  way,  followed  after,  clapping  his  hat 
sometimes  between  the  whip  and  her  back."  l 

Margaret  Brewster,  in  1677,  was,  as  she  claimed, 
"  raised  up  as  one  from  the  dead,  and  came  from  a  sick 
bed  "  "  to  bear  a  testimony  and  be  as  a  sign  to  warn  the 
bloody  town  of  Boston  to  end  its  cruel  laws."  With 
her  hair  about  her  shoulders,  ashes  on  her  head,  her  face 
coloured  black,  and  sackcloth  on  her  upper  garments,  she 
came,  attended  by  two  other  women,  on  Sunday  morning 
into  the  Rev.  Mr.  Thatcher's  meeting-house. 

"  She  came  and  stood  in  the  Old  South  Church, 

A  wonder  and  a  sign, 
With  a  look  the  old-time  sibyls  wore 

Half-crazed  and  half-divine."  2 

It  was  a  misguided  act,  no  doubt,  but  no  modern  reader 
who  studies  the  case  in  full  can  fail  to  conclude  that  her 
persecutors,  who  insisted  that  she  "  took  on  the  shape  of 
the  devil,"  and  who  whipped  her  at  the  cart's  tail  from 
the  Old  South  Church  through  the  town  of  Boston,  were 
at  least  as  "  misguided." 8 

Sad  enough  these  instances  of  hysterical  tendencies 
undoubtedly  are,  but  no  modern  historian  would  think 
seriously  of  citing  them  as  proof  that  the  Quakers  were 
lawless,  immodest,  or  fanatical.  That  they  could  stand 
such  inhuman  treatment  for  ten  years — a  veritable  reign 
of  terror — and  keep  calm  and  unmoved,  and  have  only 
these  few  instances  of  hysteria  and  misleading  impressions, 
speaks  well  for  the  character  of  their  sanity  and  restraint. 
There  is,  so  far  as  I  know,  no  instance,  in  the  list  of 
sufferings,  of  any  Quaker  who  "  recanted,"  or  who  even 

1  New  England  Judged,  pp.  383-384. 

2  Whittier's  "  In  the  Old  South  Church,"  which  deals  with  this  episode. 
8  For  Margaret  Brewster's  trial  see  Besse,  ii.  261-265. 


no    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

gave  up  his  practice  of  the  unimportant  Quaker 
"  testimonies,"  such  as  wearing  the  hat  and  saying  "  thou," 
in  order  to  win  his  freedom  or  to  spare  himself  torture. 
Not  only  is  the  story  unsullied  by  lapses  of  cowardice,  it 
is  further  an  unbroken  record  of  noble  bearing  toward  the 
instigators  and  inflicters  of  their  torment.  They  did 
undoubtedly  believe  that  the  judgments  of  Heaven  were 
to  fall  on  their  persecutors,  and  it  is  possible  that  they 
enjoyed  the  prospect — they  were  human  ;  but  in  any  case 
they  reviled  not,  they  did  not  murmur,  they  raised  no 
hand  or  threat.  They  forgave  and  even  prayed  for  their 
torturers,  and  literally  fulfilled  the  words  of  their  Master 
— "  Love  your  enemies." l 

1  Governor  Endicott  died  in  March  1665,  and  in  May  of  that  same  year  the 
royal  commissioners  commanded  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  to  allow 
Quakers  to  attend  to  their  secular  business  without  molestation.  In  1675, 
however,  a  law  was  passed  prohibiting  Quaker  meetings  in  the  Colony,  and  in  1677 
constables  were  ordered  to  make  diligent  search  for  such  meetings  and  to  ' '  break 
open  any  door  where  peaceable  entrance  is  denied  them."  This  second  brief 
period  of  persecution  marks  the  end  of  the  persecution  of  Quakers  as  such  in 
New  England,  Margaret  Brewster  being  the  last  woman  to  suffer  whipping. 


CHAPTER    VI 

LATER    EXPANSIONS    IN    NEW    ENGLAND 

IN  the  early  'seventies  of  the  seventeenth  century  there 
came  in  New  England  a  new  period  of  Quaker  expansion 
— the  greatest  since  the  first  "invasion"  in  1657.  This 
expansion  was  due  primarily  to  the  visit  of  George  Fox, 
the  founder  of  the  Society.  He  sailed  from  England  in 
the  ship  Industry  the  I  2th  of  August  1671,  in  company 
with  William  Edmundson,  Thomas  Briggs,  John  Rous, 
John  Stubbs,  Solomon  Eccles,  James  Lancaster,  John 
Cartwright,  Robert  Widders,  George  Pattison,  John  Hull, 
Elizabeth  Hooton, l  and  Elizabeth  Miars,  and  he  landed  in 
Barbadoes  the  3rd  of  October  after  a  perilous  voyage.  At 
the  time  of  his  arrival  Fox  was  in  broken  health,  too 
ill  and  weak  to  walk  for  any  distance.  During  his  three 
months  of  heavy  labour  in  the  island  he  steadily  gained 
in  physical  power  and  in  conquering  spirit.  Convince- 
ments  were  made,  meetings  were  settled,  and  those  in 
authority  in  the  island  were  impressed  with  the  message 
and  the  spiritual  ideals  of  the  Friends.  Fox  wrote  at 
this  time  his  famous  Letter  to  the  Governor  of  Barbadoes, 
in  which  he  endeavoured  to  clear  the  Quakers  "  from 
scandalous  lies  and  slanders,"  and  to  show  that  they  held 
the  essential  doctrines  of  orthodox  Christianity.  This 
Letter  has  frequently  been  cited  as  a  Declaration  of  Quaker 
faith.  It  is  not  that,  however,  for  it  deals  only  slightly 

1  Elizabeth  Hooton  wrote  in  1670  to  Margaret  Fox,  who  was  then  in  prison  : 
"  I  have  a  great  desire  to  see  thee,  if  thou  could  but  come  to  thy  husband  before 
he  go :  so  the  Lord  give  thee  some  liberty  that  thou  may  see  him.  .  .  I  know 
nothing  but  I  may  go  with  him  ;  it  hath  been  much  on  me  to  go  a  great  while, 
and  to  do  the  best  that  is  required  for  him. " 


H2    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

and  feebly  with  the  distinctive  truth  of  the  Quaker  message ; 
it  is  rather  what  it  claims  to  be — a  document  written  to 
clear  Friends  of  slander  and  heresy  on  points  of  catholic, 
i.e.  universal,  Christianity.1 

From  Barbadoes  the  party  of  publishers  crossed 
over  to  Jamaica,  where,  during  seven  weeks  of  strenuous 
labour,  a  great  convincement  of  people  was  made.  Here 
Elizabeth  Hooton,  who  had  come  to  care  for  Fox  on 
his  journey,  suddenly,  almost  without  a  warning  illness, 
passed  away  in  peace.  From  Jamaica  Fox  sailed,  in 
the  teeth  of  a  tempestuous  storm,  to  the  shore  of  Mary 
land,  and  after  a  period  of  labour  there,  which  will  be 
reviewed  in  a  later  chapter,  he  made  his  way  overland 
to  New  England,  arriving  at  Newport  the  3Oth  of  May 
1672.  On  arrival,  he  writes,  "We  had  two  very  good 
meetings,  and  many  justices,  with  the  governor  [Nicholas 
Easton],  the  deputy-governor  and  captaine,  and  all  was 
satisfyed,  and  som  of  them  said  they  did  not  think  there 
had  been  such  a  man  in  the  world." 2  Fox  was  enter 
tained  by  the  governor,  Nicholas  Easton,  who  travelled 
with  him  extensively  during  his  stay  in  the  Colony.  The 
Yearly  Meeting  of  1672  was  a  memorable  time.  Not 
only  was  Fox  there,  but  also  John  Burnyeat,  John 
Cartwright,  George  Pattison,  John  Stubbs,  James  Lancaster, 
and  Robert  Widders — all  eminent  ministers  from  abroad 
— were  in  attendance.  The  governor  and  the  deputy- 
governor  sat  in  the  sessions,  and  the  people  flocked  in  from 
all  parts  of  the  island  and  the  country  round  about,  and 
Friends  were  "  so  knit  and  united  "  that  it  required  two 
days  for  leave-taking  when  the  meetings  were  over. 
"  And  then,"  Fox  says,  "  being  mightily  filled  with  the 
presence  and  power  of  the  Lord  they  went  away  with 
joyful  hearts  to  their  various  habitations  in  the  several 

1  The  Letter  is  printed  in  the  Journal,  ii.  155-158.  This  visit  of  Fox  and 
his  companions  resulted  in  a  very  large  increase  of  Quakerism  in  Barbadoes  and 
in  the  other  West  Indies.  Some  impression  of  the  size  of  the  Society  in 
Barbadoes  can  be  gained  from  the  fact  that  the  Quaker  fines  between  the  years 
1658  and  1695  amounted  to  ^11,000.  There  were  at  the  high  water  period  of 
Quakerism  in  the  island  five  meeting-houses  there.  See  Journal  of  Friends 
Historical  Society,  v.  43. 

a  I  am  quoting  from  a  MS.  Journal  of  Fox's  American  travelsr  now  in  the 
Bodleinn  Library  (MS.  Bodleian  Addition  A  95,  f.  16). 


CH.  vi      EXPANSIONS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND        113 

colonies  where  they  lived."  l  There  are  many  indications, 
in  Friends'  journals  and  in  other  contemporary  documents, 
that  Ranters  abounded  in  many  parts  of  the  Colonies 
during  the  seventeenth  century.  Fox  found  them  in 
considerable  numbers  in  Rhode  Island,  and  he  laboured  to 
make  them  see  that  he  had  no  sympathy  with  their 
moral  and  spiritual  chaos.  "  I  had  a  great  travell,"  the 
MS.  Journal  says,  "on  my  spirit  concerning  the  ranters, 
for  they  had  been  rude  at  a  ffriends'  meeting  where  I 
was  not  at,  and  I  apoynted  a  meeting  amongst  them, 
and  I  knew  that  the  Lord  would  give  me  power  over  them, 
and  He  did!" 

During  his  stay  in  Newport,  Fox  wrote  a  letter  to 
the  magistrates  and  officers  of  the  Colony  which  shows 
the  practical  bent  of  his  mind  and  the  breadth  of  his 
social  and  civic  interests.  He  declares  that  there  is  a 
law  of  God  which  voices  itself  in  every  man  and  reveals 
the  principle  of  conduct  toward  others.  He  then 
recommends  the  Legislature  to  pass  "  a  law  against 
drunkenness  and  against  them  that  sell  liquors  to  make 
people  drunk,"2  and  "a  law  against  fighting  [probably 
duelling]  and  swearing."  He  urges  them  to  "  look  into  all 
your  ancient  liberties  and  privileges — your  divine  liberty, 
your  national  liberty,  and  all  your  outward  liberties  which 
belong  to  your  commons,  your  town,  and  your  island 
Colony."  He  recommends  "  that  you  have  a  market  once 
a  week  in  your  town  and  a  house  built  for  that  purpose ; " 
"  that  some  one  be  selected  in  every  town  and  place  in  all 
your  Colony  to  receive  and  record  all  your  births, 
marriages,  and  them  that  die."  "  Mind  that  which  is  for 
the  good  of  your  Colony  and  the  commonwealth  of  all 
people — stand  for  the  good  of  your  people  which  is  the 
good  of  yourselves."  "  Stand  up  for  the  glory  of  God,  that 
it  may  shine  over  your  Colony ;  take  off  all  oppression  in 
your  Colony,  and  set  up  justice  over  all  in  your  Colony," 

1  Journal,   ii.    169.      The    Colonies   represented   would   be   Rhode   Island, 
Massachusetts,  New  Hampshire,   Province  of  Maine  and  New  York  especially 
Long  Island. 

2  This  is  one  of  the  first  suggestions  ever  made  in  America  to  prohibit  the 
sale  of  intoxicants  by  legal  enactment 

I 


H4    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

"  and  stand  fast  in  the  liberty  wherewith  Christ  hath  made 
you  free,  in  life,  glory,  and  power." l 

It  was  at  this  time  that  Quakerism  was  planted  on  the 
western  shore  of  the  bay,  in  Narragansett.  Fox  writes  : — 

"  We  went  to  Narragansett,  about  twenty  miles  from  Rhode 
Island,  and  the  Governor,  Nicholas  Easton,  went  with  us.  We 
had  a  meeting  at  a  Justice's  house,  where  Friends  had  never  had 
any  before.  2  It  was  very  large,  for  the  country  generally  came 
in  j  and  people  came  also  from  Connecticut  and  other  parts 
round  about,  among  whom  were  four  Justices  of  the  Peace.3 
Most  of  the  people  had  never  heard  Friends  before ;  but  they 
were  mightily  affected  with  the  meeting,  and  there  is  a  great 
desire  amongst  them  after  the  Truth."4 

This  seed  became  a  great  tree,  for  this  western  shore  of 
Narragansett  Bay  proved  good  soil  for  the  message  of 
the  Inward  Light,  and  produced  many  powerful  ministers 
and  intellectual  leaders  of  the  Society. 

Another  interesting  episode  of  this  period  was  the 
theological  collision  with  Roger  Williams,  the  founder  of 
Providence.  Fox  and  the  governor  with  a  retinue  of 
Friends  went  up  by  water  from  Newport  to  Providence, 
where,  according  to  Fox,  "  God's  blessed  seed  was  exalted 
and  set  above  all."  The  account  of  the  Providence  visit, 
as  given  in  the  MS.  Journal,  is  very  quaint :  "  I  had  a 
lardge  meeting  and  a  great  travell."  "  The  people  here 
were  above  the  priests  in  high  notions,"  but  they  "  went 
away  mightyly  satisfyed,  and  said  they  had  never  heard  the 
like  before."  6  His  second  meeting  was  held  in  "  a  greate 
barne  which  was  soe  full  of  people,  yt  I  was  extremely 
soaked  with  sweat,  but  all  was  well." 

These  two  meetings  and  the  fame  of  Fox's  preaching 
powerfully  stirred  Roger  Williams.  He  was  now  an  old 

1  This  letter  is  in  the  archives  of  the  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society,  at 
Providence.  It  is  printed  in  The  Friend  ( Phila. ),  vii.  55  (1833). 

8  This  was  almost  certainly  Jireh  Bull's  house.  See  Hazard's  College  Tom, 
p.  9. 

3  Jireh  Bull,   Samuel  Wilson,   and  William   Heferman  were  the  justices  of 
Narragansett  (ibid.  p.  9). 

4  Journal,  ii.   171.     The  MS.  Journal   says  that  this  meeting  was  the  i3th 
of  July. 

5  He  mentions  that  there  came  to  the  meeting  ' '  a  woman  who  was  bad  and 
skoffed,  but  she  went  away  and  was  struck  sick." 


CH.  vi      EXPANSIONS   IN  NEW  ENGLAND        115 

man,  but  the  fire  of  his  youthful  days  rekindled  in  him 
when  he  heard  how  the  Quakers  were  spreading  their 
doctrines  among  the  people,  and  how  the  multitudes  were 
flocking  after  the  apostle  of  Inward  Light.1  He  had 
attended  the  Yearly  Meeting  at  Newport  in  1671,  where 
he  endeavoured  to  have  some  public  discourse  with  Friends, 
but  he  was  "  stopt,"  he  tells  us,  "  by  the  sudden  praying  of 
the  governor's  wife,"  and  when  he  stood  up  again  he  was 
"  stopt  by  John  Burnett's  [Burnyeat  who  was  in  Newport 
in  1671]  sudden  falling  to  prayer  and  dismissing  the 
assembly."2  He  kept  away  from  Fox,  when  the  latter 
was  holding  his  great  meetings  in  Providence,  for  "  having 
once  tried  to  get  public  speech  in  the  Assemblies  of 
Friends,"  he  was  resolved  "  to  try  another  way  and  to  offer 
a  fair  and  full  Dispute." 

Thereupon  he  drew  up  fourteen  propositions  which  he 
sent  to  the  deputy-governor,  John  Cranston,  for  him  to 
deliver  to  George  Fox.  The  Deputy  Governor,  however, 
for  some  unknown  reason,  kept  them  in  his  possession 
until  the  26th  of  July,  when  it  was  found  that  George  Fox 
had  left  Newport.  Roger  Williams  claimed  that  this 
delay  was  made  by  a  collusion  with  Fox :  "  in  the  Junto 
of  the  Foxians  at  Newport  it  was  concluded  for  Infallible 
Reasons  that  his  Holiness  G.  Fox  should  withdraw." 
"  He  knew  that  I  was  furnished  with  artillery  out  of  his 
own  Writings.  He  saw  what  consequences  would  roll 
down  the  mountaines  upon  him.  .  .  .  and  therefore  this  old 
Fox  thought  it  best  to  run  for  it  and  leave  the  work  to  his 
Journeymen  and  Chaplains  to  perform  in  his  absence." 3 
Any  one  who  knows  the  traits  and  character  of  George 
Fox  knows  that  whatever  else  happened  he  did  not  "  run 
away "  "  for  fear  of  the  consequences  which  would  roll 
down  upon  him !  "  He  himself  'declares,  in  the  New 
England  Firebrand  Quenched — the  "  Firebrand  "  being 
George  Fox's  name  for  this  "  apostle  of  soul  liberty " — 

1  Williams  says  (in  his  George  Fox  Digged  Out  of  his  Burrowes')  that  he  had 
"  long  heard  of  the  great  name  of  George  Fox"  and  had  "  already  read  his  book 
in  folio  "  ( The  Great  Mystery  of  the  Great  Whore). 

8  George  Fox  Digged  Out  of  his  Burrowes,  edited  by  J.  Lewis  Diman  (pub 
lications  of  the  Narragansett  Club),  vol.  v.  p.  19. 

3  George  Fox  Digged  Out  of  his  Burrowes. 


n6    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  r 

"  I  neither  saw  nor  ever  heard  of  any  propositions  from 
Roger  Williams,  nor  did  I  go  away  in  fear  of  him  or  them." 
Fox,  having  spent  two  months  in  Rhode  Island,  had 
started  on  his  return  journey  south  before  Roger  Williams' 
challenge  was  delivered  to  him.  His  friends — "the 
Foxian  Junto,"  as  Roger  Williams  calls  them — went 
forward  to  arrange  for  the  great  debate.  John  Stubbs, 
John  Burnyeat,  "and  six  or  seven  others,"  went  to  the 
home  of  Williams  in  Providence  to  arrange  the  pre 
liminaries.  "  Their  salutations,"  Roger  Williams  quaintly 
says,  "  were  in  silence  when  they  came  and  when  they  de 
parted — drink  being  offered  and  accepted  by  some."1 
The  date  fixed  upon  for  the  opening  of  the  "  debate  "  was 
August  9,  1672,  and  the  place  chosen  was  "the  Meeting 
House  of  the  Quakers"  in  Newport,  though  to  satisfy 
some  who  objected  to  having  the  "  discussion  carried  away 
from  the  home  town,"  it  was  arranged  to  have  seven  pro 
positions  debated  in  Newport  and  seven  in  Providence. 
The  champion  against  the  Quakers,  now  more  than  three 
score  and  ten,  rowed  by  boat  thirty  miles  to  meet  his 
opponents.  "  God  graciously  helped  me,"  he  says,  "  in 
rowing  all  day  with  my  old  bones  so  that  I  got  to 
Newport  toward  the  midnight  before  the  morning 
appointed."  Meantime,  to  supply  the  place  left  by  the 
departure  of  Fox,  William  Edmundson  opportunely  arrived 
in  Newport,  an  apostle  of  Quakerism  from  Ireland,  and  one 
of  the  foremost  of  the  early  Quaker  missionaries  who  came 
to  colonial  America.  There  were  now  three  Quaker 
debaters  against  the  doughty  old  man  who,  however,  felt 
himself  quite  equal  to  the  battle.2  Governor  Nicholas 
Easton  attended  the  debate,  and  "  maintained  the  civill 
peace ! "  The  fourteen  propositions,  as  drawn  up  by 
Roger  Williams,  were  a"s  follows : 

1  George  Fox  Digged  Out,  p.  35. 

8  This  is  Roger  Williams'  characterisation  of  his  opponents  :  "John  Stubbs, 
learned  in  the  Hebrew  and  Greek,  I  found  him  so"  ;  "  John  Burnet  [BurnyeatJ 
of  a  moderate  spirit  and  an  able  speaker" ;  and  W.  Edmundson,  ' '  who  proved  to 
be  the  chief  speaker,  a  man  not  so  able  nor  so  moderate  as  the  other  two  " — "  a 
stout,  portly  man  of  a  great  voice,  he  would  often  vapour  and  preach  long,  and 
when  I  had  patiently  waited  till  the  gust  was  over,  and  began  to  speak,  he  would 
stop  my  mouth  with  a  very  unhansome  clout  of  a  grevious  interruption,"  "a 
pragmatical  and  insulting  soul. "  See  George  Fox  Digged  Out,  p.  38. 


CH.  vi      EXPANSIONS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND        117 

"  I.  The  People  called  Quakers  are  not  true  Quakers  accord 
ing  to  the  Holy  Scriptures. 

II.  The   Jesus   Christ   they   profess  is  not   the  true  Jesus 
Christ. 

III.  The  spirit  by  which  they  are  acted  is  not  the  Spirit  of 
-God. 

IV.  They  doe  not  own  the  Holy  Scriptures. 

V.  Their  Principles  and  Professions  are  full  of  contradictions 
.and  hypocrises. 

VI.  Their  Religion  is  not  only  an  Heresy  in  matters  of  wor 
ship,  but  also  in  the  Doctrines  of  Repentance,  Faith,  etc. 

VII.  Their  Religion  is  but  a  confused  mixture  of  Popery, 
Armineanisme,  Socineanisme,  Judaisme,  etc. 

VIII.  The  People  called  Quakers  (in  effect)  hold  no  God,  no 
Christ,    no    Spirit,    no   Angel,    no  Devil,   no  Resurrection,  no 
Judgment ,  no  Heaven,  no  Hell,  but  what  is  in  man. 

IX.  All  that  their  Religion  requires  (externall  and  internall) 
to  make  converts  and  proselites,  amounts  to  no  more  than  what 
a  Reprobate  may  easily  attain  unto  and  perform. 

X.  The  Popes  of  Rome  doe  not  swell  with  and  exercise  a 
greater  Pride  than  the  Quaker  spirit  hath  expresst  and  doth  aspire 
unto,   although  many  truly  humble  souls   may   be  captivated 
amongst  them,  as  may  be  in  other  religions. 

XI.  The  Quakers'  Religion  is  more  obstructive  and  destruc 
tive  to  the  conversion  and  Salvation  of  the  Souls  of  People  than 
most  of  the  religions  this  day  extant  in  the  world. 

XII.  The  sufferings  of  the  Quakers  are  no  true  evidence  of 
the  Truth  of  their  religion. 

XIII.  Their  many  Books  and  writings  are  extremely  Poor, 
Lame,  Naked,  and  sweld  up  with  high  Titles  and  words  of 
Boasting  and  Vapour. 

XIV.  The  Spirit  of  their  Religion  tends  mainly  (i)  to  reduce 
Persons  from  Civility  to  Barbarisme.     (2)  To  an  arbitrary  Govern 
ment  and  the  Dictates  and  Decrees  of  that  sudden  spirit  that 
acts  them.     (3)  To  a  sudden  cutting  off  of  People,  yea  of  Kings 
and  Princes  opposing  them.     (4)  To  as  fiery  Persecutions  for 
matters  of  Religion  and  Conscience  as  hath  been  or  can  be 
practiced  by  any  Hunters  or  Persecutors  in  the  world.  " l 

The  debate  naturally  attracted  great  crowds,  and  was 
as  popular  and  interesting  to  the  people  of  that  period  as 
a  great  athletic  contest  would  be  now.  It  seems  to  have 
won  many  new  adherents  to  the  Quaker  faith — it  certainly 
was  felt  to  be  a  triumph  by  those  already  of  the  Quaker 

1  Fox  Digged  Out  of  his  Burrowes,  pp.  4,  5. 


n8    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

faith,  but,  looked  at  calmly  and  critically  from  the  point 
of  view  of  our  century,  it  appears  a  tilting  against 
windmills  on  both  sides.  The  two  books  l  which  record 
the  "  spiritual  battle  "  are  full  of  antiquarian  interest,  but 
they  are  a  melancholy  monument  to  the  bitterness  of 
these  seventeenth  century  theological  wars,  and  there  is 
pitifully  little  in  them — and  apparently  as  little  in  the 
debate — which  raises  into  permanent  view  the  grace  of 
saintliness,  the  beauty  of  holiness,  or  the  persuasive  sweet 
ness  of  the  divine  Light  in  men. 2 

Two  of  these  "  debaters  "  were  instrumental  in  carry 
ing  Quakerism  into  many  new  fields  in  New  England, 
and  in  more  firmly  establishing  it  where  it  was  already 
planted — John  Burnyeat  and  William  Edmundson.  John 
Burnyeat,  a  gentle  spirit  and  a  powerful  preacher,  had 

1  George  Fox  Digged  Out  of  his  Burrowes  (Boston,  1676),  and  A  New  England 
Firebrand  Quenched,  by  G.  F.  and  John  Burnyeat  (London,  1678). 

2  William  Edmundson's  account  of  the  debate  gives  an  interesting  though 
thoroughly  prejudiced  glimpse  of  the  affair  (Journal,  pp.  65-66) : — 

"  After  some  Days  Travel  by  Narragansett  and  those  Parts,  I  came  to  Rhode 
Island,  where  I  met  with  John  Burnyeat,  John  Stubbs,  and  John  Cartwright,  where 
one  Roger  Williams  an  old  Priest  and  an  Enemy  of  Truth,  had  put  forth 
Fourteen  Propositions  (as  he  called  them)  which  he  would  maintain  against  any 
of  the  Quakers  that  came  from  Old  England,  and  challenged  a  Dispute  of  seven 
of  them  at  Newport  in  Rhode  Island  and  the  other  seven  at  Providence. 

' '  I  join'd  with  Friends  in  answering  this  Challenge,  at  the  Time  and  Place 
appointed  for  the  Dispute,  which  was  to  be  in  Friends  Meeting-House  at  Newport  ; 
thither  a  great  Concourse  of  People  of  all  Sorts  gather'd.  When  those  Propositions 
(as  he  called  them)  came  to  be  discoursed  of,  they  were  all  but  Slanders  and 
Accusations  against  the  Quakers  ;  the  bitter  old  man  could  make  nothing  out,  but 
on  the  contrary  they  were  turn'd  back  upon  himself :  he  was  bafled  and  the  People 
saw  his  Weakness,  Folly  and  Envy  against  the  Truth  and  the  Friends. 

' '  There  were  many  prejudic'd  Baptists  would  fain  have  help'd  the  Old  Priest 
against  Friends  ;  but  they  durst  not  undertake  his  Charge  against  us  for  they  saw 
it  was  false  and  weak.  So  the  Testimony  of  Truth  in  the  Power  of  God  was  set 
over  all  his  false  Charges,  to  the  great  Satisfaction  of  the  People. 

"  When  this  Meeting  was  ended,  which  lasted  three  Days,  John  Stubbs  and  I 
went  to  Providence,  accompanied  with  many  Friends,  to  hear  the  other  seven 
Propositions,  which  lasted  one  Day.  John  Burnyeat  and  John  Cartwright  going 
another  way  in  Truth's  Service.  Now  at  Providence  there  was  a  very  great 
Gathering  of  People,  both  Presbyterians,  Baptists  and  Ranters.  Roger  Williams 
being  there,  I  stood  up  and  told  him  in  Public,  We  had  spent  so  many  Days  at 
Newport,  where  he  could  make  nothing  out  agreeable  to  his  Challenge ;  but  on 
the  contrary  manifested  his  Clamour,  rash  and  false  Accusations,  which  he  could 
not  prove  against  us,  that  I  was  not  willing  to  spend  much  time  in  hearing  his 
Clamour  and  false  Accusations,  having  other  service  for  the  Lord,  therefore 
would  only  spend  that  Day.  So  he  went  on,  as  he  had  done  at  Newport  at  Rhode 
Island.  We  answered  to  all  his  Charges  against  Friends  and  disprov'd  them." 
As  further  illustration  of  the  lack  of  "  grace  and  sweetness  "  in  this  debate  I  quote 
Roger  Williams'  estimate  of  Edmundson  :  "A  flash  of  wit,  a  face  of  Brass,  and  a 
Tongue  set  on  fire  from  the  Hell  of  Lyes  and  Fury  !  " 


CH.  vi      EXPANSIONS   IN   NEW  ENGLAND        119 

been  brought  into  the  Society  of  Friends  in  1653  through 
the  ministry  of  George  Fox. 

"This  blessed  man,  George  Fox,"  Burnyeat  writes,  "directed 
me  unto  the  light  and  appearance  of  Jesus  Christ  my  Saviour  in 
my  heart,  so  that  I  came  to  know  Him  and  the  glory  of  the 
Father  through  Him.  Notwithstanding  all  my  high  professions, 
from  my  youth,  of  an  imputed  righteousness,  by  which  the  guilt 
of  my  sin  would  not  be  charged  upon  me,  but  imputed  to  Christ 
and  His  righteousness  imputed  to  me,  I  now  came  to  see  that 
there  was  need  of  a  Saviour  to  save  from  sin  as  well  as  of  the 
blood  of  a  sacrificed  Christ  to  blot  out  sin.  All  my  pretence 
and  hopes  of  justification  through  an  invented  notional  faith  were 
now  seen  to  be  but  a  Babel  Tower  or  an  Adam's  fig-leaf  apron, 
and  as  I  learned  to  know  Christ's  voice  and  to  follow  Him,  He 
gave  me  eternal  life  and  manifested  His  grace  in  my  heart." * 

He  first  visited  New  England  in  1666,  where  he 
had  extended  service,  visiting  all  the  meetings  in  the 
Colonies,  as  far  north  as  "  Piscataway," 2  which  included 
the  meetings  both  in  New  Hampshire  and  Maine.  He 
covered  the  same  field  of  service  again  in  1671, 
having  once  more  had  "  blessed  service  in  Piscataway," 
and  having  also  attended  the  Yearly  Meeting  in  Newport 
that  year.  He  was  back  a  third  time  in  1672,  having 
travelled  on  horseback  with  George  Fox  all  the  way 
from  Tredhaven  Creek  in  Maryland.  Fox  says  affection 
ately  : — "  He  travelled  with  me  from  Maryland  through 
the  wilderness,  and  through  many  rivers  and  desperate 
bogs,  where  they  said  never  Englishman  nor  horse  had 
travelled  before  ;  where  we  lay  out  at  nights,  and  some 
times  in  Indian  houses,  and  many  times  were  very  hard 
put  to  it  for  provisions,  but  the  Lord  by  His  Eternal  arm 
did  support  us  and  carry  us  through  all  dangers."8 
Before  the  great  debate  with  Roger  Williams,  Burnyeat 
had  "debates"  with  "the  Elders  of  the  Church"  at 
Scituate,  Mass.,  where  "  an  abundance  of  people  "  met  in 
an  orchard,  and  again  in  Boston,  where  "  several  of  note  " 

1  Condensed  from    Burnyeat's  account  in   his  Journal  (reprint   of  ' '  Truth 
Exalted"),  pp.  149-158. 

2  Journal,  pp.  189,  190. 

3  Burnyeat's  Journal,  p.  144. 


120    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

came  to  the  meeting,  and  he  "  had  a  blessed  season  to 
open  things  to  the  people." 

With  two  other  English  Friends,  George  Pattison  and 
John  Cartwright,  he  went  on  to  "  Piscataway,"  where  the 
Quaker  Society  was  greatly  expanded  and  more  solidly 
established — "  all  things  were  settled  in  sweet  unity." 
On  his  way  back  he  found  an  incipient  schism  in  Salem, 
but  "  in  dread  power  of  the  Lord,"  he  powerfully 
exhorted  the  meeting  to  follow  the  mind  of  the  Spirit  and 
keep  in  unity.  On  his  return  to  Rhode  Island,  Burnyeat 
broke  new  ground  in  Warwick,  Rhode  Island,  "  where  no 
Friends  had  been  before,"  and  "  several  were  convinced 
and  did  own  the  truth."  Here  he  "  had  to  do  with  one 
Gorton  and  his  company,"  who,  he  says,  "  called  them 
selves  Generalists,  for  they  were  of  the  opinion  that  all 
should  be  saved.  But  they  were  in  reality  Ranters." 
Burnyeat  is  here  somewhat  colouring  his  judgment  with 
prejudice,  and  he  does  not  do  Samuel  Gorton  justice, 
though  some  of  the  Gortonians  may  have  been,  as  he  says, 
"  filthy,  unclean  spirits."  Gorton  was  a  man  of  real  vision, 
and,  with  all  his  peculiarities,  was  dedicated  to  the  truth. 
Dr.  Ezra  Stiles  has  recorded  the  following  enthusiastic 
testimony  of  Gorton's  last  disciple,  John  Angell : 

"  The  Friends  had  come  out  of  the  world  in  some  ways,  but 
still  were  in  darkness  or  twilight ;  Gorton  was  far  beyond  them,  he 
said,  on  the  highway  up  to  the  dispensation  of  light.  The  Quakers 
were  in  no  wise  to  be  compared  with  him  ;  nor  any  man  else  can 
[be  compared  with  him]  since  the  primitive  times  of  the  Church, 
especially  since  they  came  out  of  Popish  darkness.  He  said 
Gorton  was  a  holy  man  ;  wept  day  and  night  for  the  sins  of  blind 
ness  of  the  world ;  his  eyes  were  a  fountain  of  tears,  and  always 
full  of  tears — a  man  full  of  thought  and  study.  He  had  a  long 
walk  cut  through  the  trees  or  woods  by  his  house,  where  he 
constantly  walked  morning  and  evening,  and  even  in  the  depths 
of  the  night,  alone  by  himself,  for  contemplation  and  the  enjoy 
ment  of  the  dispensation  of  light.  He  was  universally  beloved 
by  all  his  neighbours,  and  the  Indians  who  esteemed  him,  not 
only  as  a  friend,  but  one  high  in  communion  with  God  in 
heaven." 1 

1   Collection  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society,  ii.  19. 


<CH.  vi      EXPANSIONS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND        121 

In  any  case  a  large  number  of  the  Gortonians  soon 
after  became  Friends  and  "  were  very  loving." l  Burnyeat 
next  undertook  the  task,  in  which  many  before  him  and 
many  after  him  failed,  to  plant  Quakerism  in  Hartford 
and  other  towns  of  the  Connecticut  Colony.  *  There 
were  no  prepared  groups  here  with  which  to  make  a 
beginning,  and,  though  John  Winthrop  of  Connecticut 
was  personally  very  kindly  disposed  to  Friends,  and  was 
intimate  with  William  Coddington,  the  Colony  as  a  whole 
was  impervious  to  the  Quaker  message. 

William  Edmundson  arrived  in  New  England  on  his 
first  missionary  visit  just  in  time  to  lead  the  great  debate 
with  Roger  Williams,  and  he  tells  us  that  it  proved  "  a 
seasonable  opportunity  to  open  many  things  to  the  people 
appertaining  to  the  Kingdom  of  God  and  Way  of 
Eternal  Life  and  Salvation.  The  meeting  [debate  in 
Providence]  concluded  in  prayer  to  Almighty  God,  and 
the  people  went  away  satisfied  and  loving."8 

He  next  went  on  and  extended  the  spiritual  conquests 
in  Warwick  among  Gorton's  people,  already  begun  by 
Burnyeat — "  the  Lord's  power  was  largely  manifested,  and 
the  people  were  very  loving,  like  Friends."  He  had 
"  refreshing  times "  in  Newport,  Narragansett,  Scituate, 
Sandwich,  and  Boston,  and  then  sailed  for  Ireland.  He 
came  back  for  a  more  extended  missionary  work  in  1675, 
coming  from  Barbadoes  in  a  yacht,  with  "  a  good 
comfortable  passage "  of  three  weeks.  It  was  "  the 
perilous  time "  of  King  Philip's  War,  and  "  Indians 
lying  hid  in  bushes  shot  men  down  as  they  travelled."4 
Whether  connected  with  the  terrible  uprising  led  by  King 
Philip  or  not,  a  fierce  Indian  war  broke  out  in  the  north 
eastern  section  of  New  England,  and  the  years  1675  and 

1  Burnyeat,  p.  211. 

2  For  an  account  of  this  undertaking  see  his  Journal,  pp.  212-216. 

3  Edrmmdson's/oarwa/,  p.  67.    William  Edmundson  was  born  in  Westmorland 
in  1627,  and  had  fought  under  Cromwell  in  the  Parliamentary  army.     In  1652  he 
settled  in  Ireland  for  purposes  of  trade,  but  on  a  business  trip  to  England  the  next 
year  he  heard  George  Fox  and  James  Nayler  preach,  and  was  ' '  convinced  "  and 
' '  seized  upon  by  the  Lord's  power. "     He  became  from  that  time  one  of  the 
foremost  exponents  of  the  new  faith  in  Ireland,  and,  as  we  shall  see,  was  one  of  the 
leading  publishers  of  Quakerism  in  Virginia  and  North  Carolina. 

4  Ibid.  p.  77. 


122    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

1676  were  crowded  with  tragic  events  for  this  region — 
the  Piscataqua  country  being  one  of  the  centres  of 
hostility.  William  Edmundson,  at  the  very  height  of  the 
trouble,  struck  out  for  the  country  "  eastward,  towards 
Piscattaway,"  where  "  by  reason  of  the  war  it  was  danger 
ous  travelling."  "  However,"  he  says,  "  I  committed  my 
life  to  God  who  gave  it,  and  took  my  journey  " — going 
by  way  of  Sandwich,  Boston,  and  Salem.  After  holding 
meetings  on  the  New  Hampshire  side  of  the  Piscataqua — 
which  he  calls  "  Piscattaway " — he  crossed  over  by  boat 
into  Maine,  where  he  had  "  large  and  precious  meetings," 
and  "  much  ground  was  broken  "  in  the  southern  end  of  the 
Province  of  Maine.  While  he  was  staying  in  the  home 
of  "  Nicholas  Shapley  "  [Major  Shapleigh] — "  a  man  of 
note  in  that  country,"  a  pioneer  Quaker  of  the  Piscataqua 
region — "  fourteen  lusty  Indians,  with  their  heads  trimmed 
and  faces  painted,"  came  to  the  house.  William  Edmundson 
"  discoursed  with  them  "  and  discovered  that  they  "intended 
mischief  in  their  hearts,  but  the  Lord  calmed  them  down, 
and  they  went  away  without  doing  any  harm."  1 

As  he  came  back  through  the  Massachusetts  towns, 
"  travelling  with  his  life  in  his  hands,"  many  were 
convinced  by  his  preaching,  especially  in  Marblehead  and 
Reading.  Most  of  the  people,  wherever  he  came  in  those 
parts,  were,  he  tells  us,  "  in  Garrisons  for  fear  of  the 
Indians,  except  Friends."  He  held  an  extraordinary 
meeting  in  a  garrison  house  in  Reading,  where,  he  says, 
"my  lieart  being  full  of  the  Power  and  Spirit  of  the  Lord,  the 
Love  of  God  ran  through  me  to  the  people  !  "  His  listeners 
were  broken  into  tears  by  the  demonstration  of  the  Spirit 
which  awakened  their  consciences,  and  an  old  man  rising 
up  took  the  speaker  in  his  arms,  and  thanked  God  that 
the  message  had  found  him.  The  people  asked  with 
naivete",  what  the  difference  was  between  their  ministers 
and  their  visitors.  Edmundson's  answer,  which  sounds  like 
Anne  Hutchinson's  charge,  was  :  "  Your  ministers  are  satis 
fied  with  talk  about  Christ  and  the  Scriptures  ;  we  are  not 
satisfied  without  the  sure,  inward  experience  of  God  and 

1  Journal,  p.  79. 


CH.  vi     EXPANSIONS   IN   NEW  ENGLAND        123 

Christ,  and  the  enjoyment  of  the  comforts  which  the 
Scriptures  promise  and  which  believers  in  primitive  times 
enjoyed."  After  many  successful  meetings  in  Massa 
chusetts,  where  people  were  "  tender  and  loving "  as  he 
told  his  message,  he  sailed  from  Boston  to  Newport,  and 
soon  followed  up  John  Burnyeat  in  another  unsuccessful 
attempt  to  spread  Quakerism  in  Connecticut.1 

One  of  the  most  important  events  in  what  I  have  been 
calling  "  the  second  expansion "  of  Quakerism  in  New 
England,  was  the  planting  of  it  in  the  island  of  Nantucket. 
The  first  settlers  of  the  island  were  in  close  sympathy 
with  Friends  and  were,  at  heart,  in  intimate  accord  with 
their  message,  though  they  had  not  become  actual 
members  of  the  Society.  The  real  pioneer  of  the  little 
island-colony  was  Thomas  Macy,  who  embarked  from 
Salisbury,  Mass.,  in  a  small  boat  in  1659,  in  company 
with  Edward  Starbuck,  Isaac  Coleman,  and  probably 
James  Coffin,  and  sailed  round  the  Cape  to  Nantucket. 
Macy  had  been  a  man  of  influence  in  Salisbury.  He  was 
a  Baptist  of  the  seeker-type  and  frequently  "  exhorted  " 
in  public.  He  came  into  collision  with  the  authorities 
for  preaching  without  ordination,  and  again  for  entertain 
ing  Quakers  in  violation  of  the  law  of  i657.2  The 
reason  assigned  for  his  migration  was  his  desire  to  follow 
his  conscience,  and  to  get  free  from  "  the  tyranny  of  the 
clergy  and  those  in  authority."  Tristram  Coffin,  father 
of  the  James  mentioned  above,  soon  joined  the  settlers  on 
the  island,  and  became  their  first  chief  magistrate.  The 
settlement  was  composed  of  persons  of  liberal  spirit  and  it 
grew  rapidly.  In  1673  Richard  Gardiner  and  his  wife, 
being  persecuted  in  Salem  "for  attending  Quaker 
meeting,"  moved  to  Nantucket  Stephen  Hussey,  son  of 
Christopher,  who  was  one  of  the  original  purchasers  of 
the  island,  became  a  "  convinced  Quaker  "  during  a  sojourn 
in  Barbadoes,  and  John  Swain  appears  also  to  have  been 
a  Quaker  before  there  was  a  meeting  on  the  island.8  But 

1  See  Journal,  pp.  83-93. 

8  Pike's   The  New  Puritan  (1879)   pp.   35  and   54  seq.     See  also  Coffin's 
History  of  Newbury.     Whittier  has  told  Macy's  story  in  his  poem  "  The  Exiles." 
*  See  Thomas  Story's  Journal  (1747),  p.  353. 


124    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

the  real  creation  of  the  Quaker  Society  in  Nantucket  was 
due  to  the  ministry  of  three  noted  men — Thomas  Chalkley, 
John  Richardson,  and  Thomas  Story — between  the  years 
1698  and  1704. 

Thomas  Chalkley,1  then  a  young  man  and  on  his  first 
visit  to  America,  came  by  sloop  to  the  "  Isle  of  Nantucket " 
in  1698.  He  spent  "several  days"  on  the  island,  where 
"  people  did  generally  acknowledge  the  truth  and  were 
tender-hearted."  Two  hundred  came  to  hear  him,  though 
"  it  was  never  known  before  that  so  many  were  together 
on  the  island."  He  made  a  deep  impression  on  his  hearers, 
and  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  Nathaniel  Starbuck,  an 
important  citizen,  "  convinced." 2  John  Richardson,  a 
native  of  Yorkshire  and  a  man  of  very  interesting  character, 
soon  followed  after,  and  carried  the  spiritual  work,  begun 
by  Thomas  Chalkley,  much  farther  on.  He  came  by 
sloop  with  Peleg  Slocum  from  Newport,  and  the  Nantucket 
settlers  crowded  to  the  shore,  "  possessed  with  great  fear  " 
that  the  sloop  was  French,  loaded  with  arms  and  men, 
come  to  take  their  island,  for  war  was  raging  between 
England  and  France.  They  were  greatly  relieved  to 
hear  that  their  visitors  "  came  in  the  love  of  God  to  hold 
meetings  among  them."  The  visitors  went  directly,  by  a 
kind  of  homing  instinct,  to  the  house  of  Nathaniel  Starbuck, 
who  was  "  in  some  degree  convinced  of  the  truth."  Here 
they  found  "  Mother  Mary  Starbuck  whom  the  islanders 
esteemed  as  a  judge  among  them,  and  little  of  moment 
was  done  without  her."  The  "prophet"  in  Richardson 
came  immediately  into  play,  and  he  saw  that  here  was 
the  pillar  for  the  building  of  a  new  Church.  "  At  the 
sight  of  her,"  he  writes,  "  it  sprang  into  my  heart,  To  this 
woman  is  the  everlasting  love  of  God."  It  was  soon 
arranged  that  the  proposed  meetings  should  be  in  her 
house.8 

1  Thomas  Chalkley  was  born  in  Southwark,  London,  in  1675.  He  moved  to 
Philadelphia  in  1701,  and  from  that  time  to  the  end  of  his  life  in  1741  he  was 
closely  identified  with  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting.  He  was  a  great  traveller,  a 
powerful  minister,  and  his  Journal  is  important  for  this  period  of  American  history. 

8  Thomas  Chalkley' s /0*r»<z/  (1751),  pp.  19,  ao. 

8  She  was  the  wife  of  Nathaniel  Starbuck,  sen.,  her  maiden  name  being 
Mary  Coffin. 


CH.  vr     EXPANSIONS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND        125 

The  first  meeting  was  held  in  a  "  large  and  bright 
rubbed  room,  with  suitable  seats  or  chairs,  the  glass 
windows  being  taken  out  of  their  frames  and  many  chairs 
placed  without  very  conveniently."  Before  the  meeting 
began,  John  Richardson  had  been  walking  up  and  down 
in  the  woods  "  under  a  very  great  load  in  spirit"  When 
it  gathered,  "the  mighty  power  of  the  Lord  began  to 
work,"  and  as  John  Richardson  records,  "the  Lord's 
heavenly  power  raised  me  and  set  me  on  my  feet  as  if 
one  had  lifted  me  up " ;  whereupon  he  proceeded  to 
"  open  and  deliver  things."  "  For  most  of  an  hour,"  he 
continues,  "the  great  woman  [Mary  Starbuck]  fought  and 
strove  against  the  message,  sometimes  looking  up  into 
my  face  with  a  pale  and  then  a  more  ruddy  complexion  ; 
but  the  strength  of  the  truth  increased,  and  the  Lord's 
mighty  power  began  to  shake  the  people  .  .  .  and  when 
she  could  no  longer  contain  she  submitted  to  the  power 
of  truth  and  lifted  up  her  voice  and  wept"  Not  only 
was  "  the  great  woman  "  won,  but  "  the  inhabitants  of  the 
island  were  shaken  and  most  of  the  people  convinced  of 
the  truth."  And  when  the  meeting  came  to  a  close, 
"they  sat  weeping  universally,"  and  could  not  disperse. 
"  After  some  time  Mary  Starbuck  stood  up,  held  out  her 
hand,  spoke  tremblingly,  and  said,  '  All  that  ever  we  have 
been  building,  and  all  that  ever  we  have  done,  is  pulled 
down  this  day ;  and  this  that  we  have  heard  is  the 
everlasting  truth.'  "  "  She,  and  as  many  as  could  be  seen, 
were  wet  with  tears,  and  the  floor  was  as  though  there 
had  been  a  shower  of  rain  upon  it"  * 

Nobody  can  read  John  Richardson's  account  of  his 
visit  on  Nantucket  without  feeling  that  there  was  a  power 
attending  his  speaking  of  a  very  novel  and  unusual  sort, 
and  his  presence  and  his  words  seem  to  have  had  an 
extraordinary  transforming  effect  upon  the  people.  He, 
however,  did  not  take  any  steps  toward  the  organization 
of  a  "  society  "  out  of  those  who  were  "  convinced."  That 
step  was  taken  by  Thomas  Story  in  the  summer  of  1704. 
Story  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  publishers  of 

1  An  Account  of  the  Life  of  John  Richardson  (1783),  pp.  84-94. 


126    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Quakerism  in  the  first  half  of  the  eighteenth  century,  a 
powerful  debater,  always  ready  to  accept  the  challenge  of 
any  Quaker  opponent,  a  moving  minister  when  the  Spirit 
opened  a  message  within  him,  and  a  too  voluminous 
writer,  whose  style  at  rare  intervals  is  clear,  vivid,  and 
marked  with  beauty.  He  visited  again  and  again  all  the 
settlements  of  Friends  in  the  American  Colonies,  and  he 
took  a  large  part  in  the  eighteenth  century  expansion  of 
Quakerism.  On  his  extended  travels  through  New 
England  he  found  his  way  to  Nantucket  He  at  once 
saw,  as  John  Richardson  had  done,  the  peculiar  gifts  and 
graces  of  Mary  Starbuck,  and  he  realised  the  power  for 
service  which  lay  in  her.  She  was,  he  says,  "  A  wise, 
discreet  woman,  well  read  in  the  Scriptures,  in  great 
reputation  throughout  the  island  for  her  knowledge  in 
matters  of  religion,  and  an  oracle  among  them  on  that 
account,  insomuch  that  they  would  not  do  anything 
without  her  advice  and  consent" l 

After  holding  a  number  of  meetings  on  the  island 
Thomas  Story  had  a  powerful  "  concern  of  mind,"  which 
took  away  his  sleep,  that  a  permanent  meeting  ought  to 
be  established  in  Nantucket,  and  his  thoughts  turned  to 
Mary  Starbuck  as  "  the  chief  instrument "  for  maintaining 
it  She  received  the  suggestion  with  "  great  gravity,  and 
it  became  her  concern,"  and  the  meeting  was  accordingly 
started  in  the  home  of  Mary  Starbuck,  where  the  neigh 
bours  of  the  island  met,  week  by  week,  "  to  wait  on  the 
Lord." z  The  meeting  thus  begun  had  a  steady  growth, 
and  by  the  opening  of  the  nineteenth  century  Nantucket 
was  one  of  the  great  centres  of  Quakerism  in  America. 
Edmund  Peckover,  of  England,  visited  Nantucket  on  his 
travels  through  New  England  in  1743.  He  found  on 
the  island  "  a  brave,  weighty,  solid  people,  living  pretty 
much  in  love  and  unity  together."  He  reports  three 
hundred  families  there,  and  estimates  that  two  hundred 
and  fifty  of  them  are  frequenters  of  the  Quaker  meeting. 
He  says  that  the  meeting-house  holds  fifteen  hundred 

1  Journal,  p.  350. 
s  Nantucket  Monthly  Meeting  was  established  the  26th  of  May  1708. 


CH.  vi     EXPANSIONS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND        127 

persons,  "  and  it  was  very  full  when  we  were  there." 
"  They  have  seven  or  eight  Public  Friends." l  Samuel 
Fothergill,  who  was  on  Nantucket  in  1755,  says  that 
more  than  fifteen  hundred  attended  the  meeting  which 
he  held  there — most  of  them  professors  of  truth.  He 
adds  that  "the  richest  part  of  the  inhabitants  [of  the 
island]  embraced  the  principles  of  truth  from  conviction  ; 
the  others  thought  the  expense  of  maintaining  a  priest 
would  be  too  heavy  for  them  and  have  turned  Quaker  to 
save  money !  " 2 

It  is  not  possible,  within  the  space  at  command,  to 
speak  of  the  other  contributors,  of  whom  there  were 
many,3  to  the  spread  of  Quakerism  in  the  New  England 
Colonies  in  the  eighteenth  century.  Something,  however, 
must  be  said,  though  briefly,  of  the  extraordinary  work 
and  influence  of  the  Fothergills — father  and  son — and  of 
two  or  three  other  "  publishers "  of  special  historical 
importance.  The  two  Fothergills,  John  and  Samuel, 
were  highly  endowed,  broad  in  their  intellectual  outlook, 
refined  and  gentle  in  breeding,  possessed  of  the  best 
culture  of  their  time,  and  withal  delicately  responsive  to 
celestial  currents,  so  that  through  them  the  New  England 
Friends  and  their  neighbours  became  partakers  of  the 
maturest  fruits  of  the  spiritual  life  of  that  period.  John 
Fothergill  came  from  his  English  home  three  times — in 
1706,  1722,  and  1737 — traversing  each  time  the  entire 
circle  of  Quaker  communities  from  Newport  to  the 
Piscataqua  region.  In  1722  he  reports  two  thousand 
persons  at  the  Newport  Yearly  Meeting  at  which  there 
was  "  a  demonstration  of  the  Eternal  power  of  God  and 
a  confirmation  of  many  souls."  4  His  final  visit  occurred 
when  "  the  Great  Awakening  "  in  New  England  was  in  its 

1  Journal  of  Edmund   Peckover,   printed  in  Journal  of  Friends'  Historical 
Society  (London),  i.  95-109.     He  says  that  the  inhabitants  of  Nantucket  cleared 
20,000  pounds  sterling  from  their  catch   of   "  Sperma  Ceeti  whales"  during 
their  last  fishing  season  (p.  106). 

2  Fothergill's  Memoirs,  p.  107.     H.  B.  Worth,  in  his  Quakerism  on  Nantucket 
(1896),  estimates  that  in  1794  half  the  population  of  the  island,  then  amounting  to 
5600  inhabitants,  attended  the  Friends'  meeting. 

8  No  less  than  576  "  public  Friends"  visited  Nantucket  meeting  for  the  pur 
pose  of  ministering,  between  the  years  1701  and  1780. 
4  Life  and  Travels  of  John  Fothergill  (1753),  P-  ISI- 


128    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

first  stages.  His  son  Samuel  came  after  the  "  Awakening  " 
had  run  its  full  course,  and  he  was  admirably,  almost 
perfectly,  fitted  by  nature  and  grace  to  "  speak  to  the 
condition "  of  the  serious,  seeking  souls  who  had  been 
first  highly  wrought  up  by  the  revival,  and  then  left 
somewhat  stranded  by  the  back  ebb  which  succeeded  the 
high  tide  of  religious  emotion. 

One  of  the  primary  ideas  which  the  Leaders  of  "  the 
Great  Awakening,"  especially  Jonathan  Edwards,  had 
insisted  on  was  the  fact  of  the  immediate  contact  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  with  the  human  soul,  and  the  necessity  of 
a  change  wrought  thus  directly  upon  the  soul  by  this 
influence.  The  soul  must  be  touched  by  the  Holy  Spirit, 
Edwards  had  urged,  or  it  cannot  be  saved.  The  energising 
will  of  God  must  act  upon  it  and  move  it  to  a  passionate 
desire  for  salvation.  Under  the  powerful  preaching  of 
Edwards  and  Whitefield  there  were  many  evidences  of 
immediate  divine  influence,  but  involved  with  the  move 
ment  there  was  such  intense  emotion,  such  high-wrought 
enthusiasm,  such  vivid  appeals  to  the  imagination,  that 
many  distressing  phenomena,  of  the  sort  usually  occurring 
at  times  of  high  nervous  tension,  broke  out,  and,  as 
intimated  above,  when  the  long  revival  period  had  run  its 
course,  there  came  a  serious  spiritual  ebb  and  a  positive 
reaction.1 

It  was  at  this  critical  moment  that  the  distinguished 
English  minister,  Samuel  Fothergill,  arrived  in  Newport, 
where  fifteen  years  before  George  Whitefield  had  begun 
his  wonderful  tour  of  the  New  England  towns.  Fother- 

1  While  the  work  of  Whitefield  was  at  its  height,  the  Friends  of  Rhode 
Island  received  a  most  peculiar  challenge  to  try  their  religion  with  Moses  Bartlett, 
who  styled  himself  ' ' a  real  Christian. "  His  letter  was  as  follows :  "To  the 
Quaker  Ministers  in  this  town  and  Colony :  There  is  a  wonderful  Reformation  in 
Connecticut  Colony  among  the  Presbyterians,  where  the  everlasting  gospel  is 
preached  ;  but  I  have  heard  some  of  you  blaspheme  against  it  abominably  ;  but 
I  desire  you  to  Dispute  me  in  order  to  vindicate  your  Orders,  which  you  call 
Friends  Orders,  for  they  are  antiscriptural,  and  so  consequently  of  the  Devil ;  You 
shall  have  the  liberty  to  pick  out  as  many  able  men  as  you  please,  if  it  be  as  many 
as  there  was  Prophets  of  Baal ;  only  I  will  have  the  same  measure  of  time  as 
you ;  and  we  will  have  it  all  written.  It  may  be  you  will  ask  what  People  I 
am  of?  To  which  I  answer,  you  may  call  me  a  Presbyterian  if  you  please, 
but  I  call  myself  a  real  Christian."  Printed  in  Arnold's  History  of  Rhode 
Island,  ii.  138. 


CH.  vi     EXPANSIONS  IN  NEW  ENGLAND        129 

gill's  coming — the  result  of  ten  years  of  deep  travail  of 
spirit — was  a  happy  event  for  the  religious  life  of  New 
England.  He,  too,  believed  with  all  his  profound  being, 
that  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God  was  in  immediate  relation 
with  the  lives  of  men.  He  believed,  no  less  definitely 
than  Edwards  did,  that  the  important  changes  in  human 
lives  are  due  to  the  work  of  God  within,  but  he  insisted 
that  the  energising  will  of  God  worked  in  all  men  and 
not  alone  in  an  elected  few,  and  that  the  choice  which 
brings  salvation  is  a  human  choice.  With  him  this  great 
truth  that  the  soul  has  immediate  contact  with  God  had 
passed  from  the  stage  of  intense  enthusiasm,  which  always 
goes  with  its  discovery,  to  a  stage  of  calm  and  dignified 
power  due  to  the  penetration  of  his  personality  with  this 
inward  light  and  grace.  He  was  a  glowing  exhibition,  as 
he  stood  before  the  great  throngs  that  came  to  hear  him, 
and  as  he  moved  quietly  among  men  in  his  daily  walk,  of 
a  type  of  life  which  demonstrates  beyond  all  arguments 
the  incoming  of  the  divine  into  the  human. 

The  divine  favour  which  attended  his  ministry  in 
Rhode  Island  "brought  the  deepest  reverence  upon  my 
soul,"  he  writes,  "  and  tears  of  joy  and  comfort "  from  the 
people,  and  "  the  Great  Name  spread  itself  afresh." l  He 
visited  all  the  Quaker  centres,  and  broke  new  ground  in 
the  Province  of  Maine,  going  as  far  as  Casco  Bay.  He 
writes  of  this  eastern  visit,  "  Truth  has  opened  my  way 
in  several  places  where  no  Friends  lived,  and  my  heart 
has  been  bowed  with  reverence  to  observe  and  feel  the 
openness  and  visitation  of  love  and  life.  The  people 
flock  into  meetings  in  crowds  and  behave  with  great 
solidity."  The  effect  of  his  preaching  and  the  impression 
he  made  is  well  shown  in  his  modest  account  of  his  great 
public  meeting  in  Boston,  held  almost  exactly  a  hundred 
years  from  the  time  of  the  arrival  of  those  first  unwelcome 
Quakers : 

1  He  says  that  the  number  of  people  at  New  England  Yearly  Meeting  at  the 
time  of  his  visit  was  very  great,  it  being  in  attendance  the  largest  Yearly  Meeting 
in  the  world.  Memoirs,  p.  188.  Edmund  Peckover  says  that  the  attendance  in 
1743  was  not  less  than  5000.  "I  never  was  at  so  large  a  meeting  before — a 
most  solemn,  weighty,  awful  time.  People  from  150  miles  to  the  eastward  came 
toil." — Journal  Friends  Historical  Society,  i.  102. 

K 


130    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

"  znd  of  8//fc  Month. — I  dropped  my  pen  yesterday  under  a 
weighty  concern  to  appoint  an  evening  meeting  in  this  place, 
and  upon  its  being  mentioned  to  the  magistrates,  they  cheerfully 
offered  either  one  of  their  own  places  of  worship,  or  the  Town- 
hall,  saying  that  our  own  house  was  too  small  to  accommodate 
the  people  who  inclined  to  come  in.  I  found  more  freedom  to 
accept  their  offer  of  the  hall,  and  had  a  very  large  meeting  in 
the  evening,  at  which  were  present  about  two  thousand  people, 
and  amongst  them  nearly  all  the  magistracy  of  the  place,  several 
of  their  ministers  and  principal  people :  it  was  a  time,  I  believe, 
never  to  be  forgotten  ;  the  power  and  the  wisdom  of  Truth  was  a 
canopy  over  the  meeting,  and  I  believe  the  Truth  itself  gained  great 
ground ;  let  every  part  of  the  gain,  glory,  and  profit  be  ascribed 
to  that  excellent  Name  in  and  from  which  all  wisdom  and 
strength  proceed.  One  of  their  ancient  professors  said  pretty 
loud,  at  the  close  of  the  meeting,  'I  thank  God  that  I  have 
once  heard  the  Gospel  of  life  and  peace  preached  in  its  purity 
as  it  hath  been  this  day.' " 

Samuel  Fothergill's  visit  to  the  meetings  of  the  Friends 
in  the  Province  of  Maine  marks  an  epoch  in  the  develop 
ment  of  Quakerism  in  that  section  of  the  country.  There 
had  been  a  few  scattered  Friends  in  the  Province  since 
the  visit  of  Alice  Ambrose  and  Mary  Tomkins  to  Kittery 
in  1662,  when  a  meeting  was  formed  in  the  Eliot  section 
of  this  township.  The  town  records  of  Scarboro,  Maine, 
state  that  Stephen  Collins  and  Sarah  Mills  were  fined  in 
1665  for  refusing  to  support  the  minister  of  the  town, 
and  in  1671  Moses  Collins  and  Sarah  Mills  were  whipped 
for  being  Quakers1 — the  only  instance  of  whipping  a 
Quaker  in  the  Province  of  Maine. 

A  meeting  was  begun  in  Falmouth,  now  Portland, 
the  Casco  Bay  of  Fothergill's  account,  about  1 740.  The 
Rev.  Mr.  Smith,  Congregational  minister  in  the  church 
at  Falmouth,  records  in  his  diary,  3Oth  July  1740,  this 
memorable  fact :  "  The  Church  kept  a  day  of  fasting  and 
prayer  on  account  of  the  spread  of  Quakerism  "  ;  and  22nd 
July  1745,  he  records  that  there  are  "many  strange  [i.e. 
foreign]  Quakers  in  town." 2  This  group  of  Friends  at 
Falmouth  was  visited  in  1743  by  the  English  minister, 

1  Collection  of  Maine  Historical  Society,  iii.  71  and  154. 
2  Ibid.,  vii.  221. 


CH.  vi      EXPANSIONS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND        131 

Edmund  Peckover  and  his  companions.  "  We  went,"  he 
writes,  "  about  seventy  miles  farther  [from  Dover,  New 
Hampshire]  by  the  seaside  to  a  place  called  Gascoe  Bay 
[should  be  Casco  Bay]  where  a  few  Friends  are  settled. 
They  have  got  a  meeting  both  First  days  and  Week-days. 
I  believe  there  are  not  fewer  than  thirty  who  come  pretty 
constantly  to  meetings  and,  I  think,  have  three  or  four 
who  appear  in  public  testimony."  * 

A  third  meeting  within  the  Province  of  Maine  owed 
its  origin  to  a  remarkable  visit  of  the  Pennsylvania  Quaker, 
John  Churchman.  He  made  a  tour  of  New  England  in 
1742,  and  went  as  far  east  as  Kittery,  where  he  found  a 
"  tender  people,"  probably  the  group  composing  the  Eliot 
meeting.  As  he  lay  in  bed  at  a  Friend's  house  he  felt  a 
"  call "  to  a  new  field.  In  his  own  quaint  language  he 
tells  the  story : 

"On  third  day  morning,  as  I  lay  in  bed,  I  felt  my  mind 
drawn  towards  the  north-west,  which  was  an  exercise  to  me; 
for  I  had  before  thought  myself  at  liberty  to  return  towards 
Boston.  I  arose  about  sun-rise,  and  asked  the  friend  where  I 
lodged  whether  any  Friends  lived  at  a  distance  on  that  quarter, 
for  that  I  had  a  draft  that  way  ?  He  answered,  No,  and  asked 
how  far  I  thought  to  go.  I  told  him  it  did  not  seem  to  me  to 
be  more  than  ten  miles.  He  said  there  was  a  people  about 
eight  miles  distant,  which  he  supposed  was  the  place  to  which  I 
felt  the  draft.  I  desired  him  to  send  a  lad  with  a  few  lines  to 
some  person  that  he  knew,  to  inform  them  that  a  stranger  would 
be  glad  to  have  a  meeting  among  them  at  the  eleventh  hour  of 
that  day,  if  they  were  free  to  grant  it ;  which  he  did,  and  with 
his  wife  went  with  me :  so  that  we  got  to  the  place  near  the 
time  proposed,  and  found  a  considerable  gathering  of  people, 
that  I  wondered  how  it  could  be  in  so  short  a  time,  not  more 
than  three  hours'  warning.  They  were  preparing  seats,  by  laying 
boards  on  blocks  in  a  pretty  large  new  house,  and  soon  sat  down 
in  an  orderly  manner.  I  went  in  great  fear  and  inward  weak 
ness  ;  and  at  the  sight  of  such  a  gathering  of  people,  and  none 
of  our  profession  among  them,  except  the  friend  and  his  wife 
who  accompanied  me,  and  two  others  who  joined  us  in  the  way, 
my  spirit  was  greatly  bowed,  and  my  heart  filled  with  secret  cries 
to  the  Lord,  that  He  would  be  pleased  to  magnify  His  own  power ; 

1  Journal  Friends  Historical  Society,  L  103. 


132    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

and,  blessed  for  ever  be  His  holy  name  !  He  heard  my  cry,  and 
furnished  me  with  wisdom  and  strength  to  declare  His  word  to 
the  people,  among  whom  there  were  some  very  tender  seekers 
after  the  true  knowledge  of  God ;  and  the  doctrine  of  truth 
flowed  freely  towards  them,  the  universality  of  the  love  of  God 
being  set  forth,  in  opposition  to  the  common  predestinarian 
notion  of  election  and  reprobation.  When  the  meeting  was 
over  I  felt  an  uncommon  freedom  to  leave  them,  for  they  began 
to  show  their  satisfaction  with  the  opportunity  in  many  words. 
So  speaking  to  the  friend  that  went  with  me,  we  withdrew  and 
went  to  our  horses ;  and  I  immediately  mounting,  beheld  the 
man  of  the  house  where  the  meeting  was  held  running  to  me, 
who,  taking  hold  of  the  bridle,  told  me  I  must  not  go  away 
without  dining  with  them.  I  looked  steadfast  on  him,  and  told 
him  that  I  did  believe  this  was  a  visitation  for  their  good,  but  I 
was  fearful  that  they,  by  talking  too  freely  and  too  much,  would 
be  in  danger  of  losing  the  benefit  thereof,  and  miss  of  the  good 
that  the  Lord  intended  for  them ;  and  my  going  away  was  in 
order  to  example  them  to  go  home  to  their  own  houses,  and 
turn  inward,  and  retire  to  that  of  God  in  their  own  hearts,  which 
was  the  only  way  to  grow  in  religion.  So  I  left  him  and  returned 
with  my  friend  Joseph  Eastes  and  his  wife." l 

This  was  apparently  the  beginning  of  Quakerism  in 
the  township  of  Berwick.  The  fourth  group  was  formed 
in  the  town  of  North  Yarmouth  (now  Harpswell)  in  1751, 
and  from  this  settlement  it  spread  out  into  new  regions 
north  and  west.  In  Historical  Collections  of  Maine  is 
preserved  this  interesting  petition  to  Governor  Shirley  in 
1756,  from  the  citizens  of  Merryconege  Neck,  in  the 
Province  of  Maine  : 2 

"  The  Inhabitants  of  the  Neck,  Being  desirous  of  the  good 
Welfare  and  Increase  of  this  Place,  most  humbly  beg,  etc.  The 
Parish  is  But  a  New  Settlement  and  there  are  many  Opinionists 
[a  footnote  explains  that  they  are  Quakers]  settled  among  us 
which  is  a  Great  Damage  to  ye  Parish ;  and  we  have  been  at  very 
Great  charges  of  late  respecting  some  Public  Affairs,  and  those 
Opinionists  will  not  in  the  least  Strive  for  the  Promotion  of  Sd 
Parish  or  in  ye  least  Pay  Precinct  Charges."  3 

1  Gospel  Labours  of  John  Churchman,  p.  73. 

8  The  upper  part  of  Merryconege  Neck  adjoined  the  township  of  Brunswick, 
and  the  lower  part  joined  North  Yarmouth. 

*  Collection  of  Maine  Historical  Society,  xiiL  42. 


CH.  vi     EXPANSIONS   IN  NEW  ENGLAND        133 

These  new  groups  were  visited  in  1757  by  William 
Reckitt,  an  English  travelling  friend.  He  says : 

"  We  went  to  Barwick  and  had  several  meetings  there ;  travelled 
through  the  woods  to  Casco,  where  we  had  an  opportunity  with 
Friends  and  such  as  attend  their  meetings.  We  crossed  the 
Bay  to  Small  Point,  and  in  our  return  had  a  meeting  upon  a 
Neck  of  land  called  Meryconeague." 1 

About  1771  most  of  the  Friends  who  formed  the 
little  society  in  Harpswell  moved  to  the  Plantation  pf 
Royaltown,  which  afterwards  became  the  township  of 
Durham,  and  a  Quaker  centre  of  great  future  promise 
sprang  up  here.  Another  group  was  formed  during  the 
'sixties  of  that  century  in  the  town  of  Windham. 

The  great  expansion  of  Quakerism  in  Maine  was, 
however,  due  to  the  work  of  David  Sands,  a  minister 
from  the  Colony  of  New  York.  He  was,  like  most  of  the 
missionaries  who  have  figured  in  this  history,  a  man  of 
rare  sensitiveness  to  inward  impressions,  loyally  obedient 
to  intimations  of  duty,  quick  to  feel  what  ought  to  be 
done  with  a  given  situation,  and  withal  possessed  of  much 
of  that  indefinable  influence  which  we  call  spiritual  power. 
To  him  more  than  to  any  other  one  individual  we  must 
attribute  the  spread  of  Quakerism  through  the  great 
county  of  Kennebec,  in  the  south-central  part  of  Maine, 
where  it  has  since  flourished. 

He  spent  two  years  and  six  months  on  his  first  tour, 
starting  in  the  spring  of  1777.  Much  of  the  time  he  was 
travelling  in  wilderness  country,  carrying  his  axe  to  clear 
his  way  as  he  went,  going  frequently  on  foot  and  "endur 
ing  great  hardships."2  Like  most  of  these  itinerant 
ministers  who  were  the  real  creators  of  New  England 
Quakerism,  he  went  first  to  the  well-organised  centres, 
such  as  Newport  and  Nantucket,  where  he  visited  not 
only  meetings  but  every  family  of  Friends.  Then  he 
pushed  on  to  the  newer,  less  organised  centres  at 
Falmouth  and  Windham,  and  finally  he  struck  out  on 
foot  into  wilderness  regions,  making  for  the  scattered 

1  Reckitt's  Life  and  Labours  (London,  1776),  p.  113. 
2  See  Journal  of  David  Sands  (1848),  p.  n. 


134    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

settlements  which  were  being  formed  in  the  beautiful  and 
fertile  Province  of  Maine.  "  We  had  many  meetings,"  he 
says,  "  while  passing  through  a  wilderness  country  and 
found  many  seeking  minds." 

"I  have  spent  part  of  the  fall  and  most  of  the  winter,"  he 
writes  his  wife  in  1779,  "amongst  a  people  not  of  our  profession, 
many  of  whom  received  me  very  kindly  and  also  my  message, 
which  made  them  feel  near  to  me,  and  their  hearts  and  houses 
are  open  to  receive  Friends.  I  have  an  untrodden  path  to  tread 
where  no  Friends  before  have  travelled  in  the  work  of  ministry. 
I  have  passed  through  many  towns  where  there  are  no  religious 
meetings  of  any  sort.  The  Lord  has  led  me  through  the  wilder 
ness  land ;  He  has  preserved  me  through  the  cold ;  in  sickness 
and  health  and  through  every  trial,  of  which  I  have  had  many. 
In  that  love  which  time  or  distance  cannot  change  I  salute 
thee." ] 

As  a  result  of  these  patient  labours  of  David  Sands 
and  his  powerful  ministry,  often  strikingly  appropriate  to 
the  situation,  there  was  formed  a  chain  of  new  meetings 
in  the  belt  of  the  country  fringing  the  Kennebec  River, 
and  the  close  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  that  is  to  say 
the  close  of  the  Colonial  Era,  thus  marks  the  high-water 
point  of  Quaker  expansion  in  New  England. 

These  visiting,  itinerant  ministers  or  missionaries  have 
been  spoken  of  as  "the  real  creators  of  New  England 
Quakerism."  So,  in  a  sense,  they  were.  But  the 
statement  is  only  partially  true.  The  true  source  of  its 
strength  and  power  lay,  from  the  very  beginning,  in  the 
character  of  the  native  material  out  of  which  the  meetings 

1  Journal,  p.  25.  The  following  letter  from  Joseph  Wing,  a  companion  to 
David  Sands  on  a  later  visit,  gives  a  good  idea  of  their  difficulties  :  "  Sometimes 
traveld  from  12  to  17  miles  between  houses  and  had  the  advantage  of  a  foot 
parth  with  marked  trees  to  Gide  us.  Sometimes  got  but  two  meals  a  Day  and 
them  were  Corse  tu  ;  There  were  Walks  Not  very  pleasant  to  the  Natural  part, 
but  so  it  is,  and  it  is  Not  best  that  we  should  have  Smooth  things  all  the  time  : 
we  had  once  to  lay  in  the  bottom  of  a  Small  bote  and  coverd  us  with  our  Sales, 
once  laid  on  the  beach  by  the  side  of  a  Fier  and  had  our  Saddle  bags  to  lay  our 
heads  on  and  our  Great  Coats  and  Misketers  to  Cover  us,  and  once  Expected  to 
have  laid  in  the  woods  without  the  advantage  of  Fier  or  victuals  and  had  Come 
to  a  Conclusion  in  what  manner  it  should  take  place,  but  Jest  before  Daylight  left 
us  we  saw  a  lite  which  proved  to  be  a  hous  to  our  great  joy  and  Satisfaction — So 
the  Great  Master  is  pleased  at  times  to  try  us  with  the  Site  of  Danger  and  then 
from  time  to  time  doth  preserve  us  from  it :  in  this  Dessolate  Wilderness  there 
was  many  kinds  of  Wild  Varmants  which  had  been  known  to  pray  upon  people." 
— Bulletin  of  Friends  Historical  Society,  Philadelphia,  vol  i.  No.  3,  p.  113. 


CH.  vi     EXPANSIONS  IN   NEW  ENGLAND        135 

were  builded.  Those  who  were  attracted  by  the  message 
of  the  itinerant  preachers  were  already  prepared  in  advance 
for  a  spiritual  type  of  religion.  They  were,  as  so  many 
of  these  Journals  intimate,  already  dissatisfied  with  form 
and  ceremony,  out  of  sympathy  with  the  legal  aspect  of 
religion  and  "  seekers "  after  a  life  inwardly  fed  and 
vitalised. 

Mary  Starbuck,  "  the  great  woman,"  who  seemed  to 
John  Richardson  and  Thomas  Story  divinely  prepared  to 
be  the  "  pillar  "  of  a  Quaker  Meeting  in  Nantucket,  was  no 
solitary  example.  Wherever  Quakerism  took  root  and 
grew  there  were  persons  of  this  prepared  type  already 
there,  and  they  formed  the  nucleus  of  the  local  "  Society." 
David  Sands  found  in  the  Maine  woods  at  Vassalborough 
a  man  named  Remington  Hobby,  who  was  a  person  of 
strong  native  traits  and  capacities,  solid  in  judgment, 
inclined  to  a  religion  of  inward  reality,  and  waiting  for  a 
spark  to  kindle  him  to  the  fusing-point.  He,  under  the 
personal  influence  and  message  of  David  Sands,  became 
the  "  live  centre "  of  the  new  Society  in  that  region. 
Something  like  that  occurred  in  each  locality  where  the 
message  became  an  organising  force.  But  the  one 
dynamic  person,  important  enough  to  be  named  as  the 
"  live  centre,"  was  only  one  among  many  of  like  traits  and 
character.  The  reason  that  these  "  little  societies  "  in  the 
new  world  were  novel  and  extraordinary  was  that  they  were 
composed  of  remarkable  persons,  prepared  by  years  of 
experience  for  a  type  of  religion  which  called  in  an 
unusual  degree  for  individual  responsibility  and  personal 
initiative,  and  which  dispensed  with  adventitious  helps 
and  brought  each  member  into  the  apostolic  succession. 
There  were  no  doubt  many  who  were  commonplace  in 
endowments  and  power,  and  whose  religion  was  in  the  main 
perfunctory,  but  there  was  at  the  centre  of  all  the 
meetings  which  I  have  closely  studied  a  group  of  persons 
who  had  a  live  religion,  and  who  knew  how  to  share  their 
spiritual  gains  with  the  group  to  which  they  belonged. 
They,  as  much  as  their  distinguished  visitors,  were  the 
creators  of  New  England  Quakerism. 


CHAPTER    VII 

A    NEW   TYPE   OF   SOCIAL    RELIGION 

THE  Quakers  were,  as  the  preceding  chapters  have 
shown,  a  mystical  people,  holding  as  a  primary  article  of 
their  faith  that  the  Divine  Spirit,  or  Eternal  Christ,  is  an 
actual  Presence  in  the  human  soul,  at  first  appearing  as 
a  judging  or  condemning  Principle,  and  later,  through 
the  conformity  and  obedience  of  the  individual,  as  an 
illuminating,  inspiring,  and  guiding  inward  Spirit.  This 
mystical  principle  sounded  to  the  ears  of  their  opponents 
like  a  dangerous  leaven  of  wild  disorder,  a  seed  of 
Ranterism  which,  when  grown,  would  topple  down  the 
pillars  of  Church  and  State.  It  seemed  to  mean  that 
individual  caprice  and  subjective  whim  were  to  be  crowned 
and  mitred,  and  that  moral  chaos  was  to  come  again. 
Something  very  different,  however,  actually  happened — 
something  quite  worth  study.  The  most  interesting 
contribution  of  the  Quakers  is  their  success  in  constructing 
and  maintaining  a  type  of  social  religion  in  which  the 
claim  of  a  divine  Light,  lighting  the  individual  soul  from 
within,  was  united  with  a  thoroughly  ordered  and  practical 
group-life  quite  unique  in  the  history  of  Christianity. 

From  the  very  first  the  central  feature  of  their  religion 
in  the  New  England  Colonies  was  "  the  meeting " — the 
meeting  for  worship.  This  was  a  peculiarly  august 
gathering.  The  people  composing  it  were  plain  ordinary 
men  and  women,  who  yoked  their  own  oxen,  ploughed 
their  own  fields,  wove  their  own  cloth,  and  washed  their 
own  dishes.  Many  of  them  drove  in  their  wagons  several 
miles  to  attend  it,  and  through  the  early  period  they 

136 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      137 

risked  arrest  and  heavy  fines  in  many  parts  of  the  Colony 
whenever  they  gathered  with  their  neighbours  for  this 
purpose. 

In  the  early  stage  of  the  movement  the  meetings  of 
every  sort  were  held  in  dwelling-houses,  and  we  have  here 
an  interesting  repetition  of  the  custom  which  prevailed  in 
the  early  apostolic  Church.  Recent  scholars  have  shown 
that  wherever  Christians  went  they  had  "  house  churches," 
for  which  purpose  some  well-to-do  member  furnished  his 
house.1  So,  too,  did  the  early  New  England  Friends,  and 
the  gatherings  were  invariably  held  in  the  large  living 
room  of  some  prosperous  colonist,  for  instance  in  the  home 
of  William  Coddington  in  Newport,  of  John  Nowland  in 
Sandwich,  of  Edward  Wanton  in  Scituate,  and  of  John 
Chamberlein  in  Boston.2 

But,  however  plain  and  marked  with  toil  these  Friends 
might  be,  and  however  imminent  the  danger  of  persecution 
might  be,  in  "  the  meeting "  on  First  day  morning  they 
felt  themselves  in  heavenly  places.  They  were  moved 
and  animated,  quickened  and  possessed  with  a  common 
faith  that  God  was  with  them  in  their  meeting,  and  that 
they  were  admitted  behind  the  veil  into  the  holy  of  holies. 
The  silence  was  intense,  for  it  was  living  and  dynamic, 
and  they  believed  that  there  in  the  hush,  in  their  humble 
group,  the  great  God  of  the  Universe  was  preparing  a 
mouthpiece  for  His  word,  and  that  when  the  seal  of 
silence  was  broken  and  utterance  should  come,  it  would 
be  the  prophetic  word  of  the  Lord.  There  were  tears  of 
joy  and  rapture  on  many  faces  as  they  sat  in  stillness,  and 
a  tremulous  movement  often  swept  over  the  company, 
making  the  name  of  "  Quaker "  not  altogether  in 
appropriate.3 

1  Friends  appear  sometimes  to  have  called  their  ' '  meetings  "  Churches.  The 
following  minute  is  from  the  Records  of  Rhode  Island  Monthly  Meeting  for 
6th  July  1688  :  "This  Meeting  thought  fit  to  write  to  ye  Chirch  of  Friends  in 
Plymouth,  to  remind  them  to  bring  in  their  sufferings  to  ye  next  Yearly  Meeting." 

8  The  Yearly  Meeting  was  held  in  William  Coddington's  house  until  his  death, 
and  Quarterly  Meeting  was  held  for  years  in  Edward  Wanton's  house.  Meeting 
houses  were  built  in  Newport  and  in  Sandwich  as  early  as  1672  and  1673,  DUt 
they  were  small  structures,  and  larger  meetings  were  still  for  some  years  held  in 
private  houses. 

8  I  am  drawing  for  my  account  on  the  early  Journals  of  Friends. 


138    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

The  speaking,  when  it  came,  was  somewhat  rhythmical 
and  rapturous,  loaded  with  emotion.  It  was  closely 
interwoven  with  a  tissue  of  Scripture  texts  and  phrases, 
bearing  mainly  on  the  central  idea  that  God  had  now 
come  to  visit  His  people,  to  give  them  the  Day  Star 
experience  in  their  hearts,  and  to  be  a  present  Guest  in 
their  midst.  Suddenly  the  voice  would  drop,  the  cadence 
disappear,  and  the  speaker  would  give,  in  genuine  simplicity, 
some  personal  experience  which  had  been  granted  to  him. 
There  might  be  many  such  "  exercises "  from  the  group, 
all  bearing  a  common  tinge  and  as  though  forged  in  a 
common  experience.  If  a  minister  "from  abroad"  were 
present,  as  often  was  the  case  in  these  early  days,  the 
"  word  "  would  be  more  likely  to  come  as  a  discourse  of 
interpretation,  instruction,  and  edification  from  him,  and 
the  listeners,  believing  implicitly  that  the  visitor  was  sent, 
would  be  deeply  attentive  to  what  he  opened  to  them 
and  powerfully  impressed  by  it.  As  some  one  knelt  to 
pray  all  hats  were  removed,  for  they  were  generally  worn 
at  other  times  ;  all  stood,  and  the  person  on  his  knees, 
with  trembling  frame  and  tremulous  voice,  uttered  what 
seemed  to  him  the  common  need  of  the  meeting  as  in  the 
stillness  it  had  surged  up  into  his  responsive  soul.  "  The 
meeting"  was  thus  not  a  place  for  venting  individual 
whim  and  personal  caprice.  It  was  the  time  when 
many  individuals  were  merged  and  baptized  into  a 
living  group,  with  a  common  consciousness  of  a  divine 
Presence,  and  the  utterances  which  were  given  were 
expected  to  be  "  in  the  common  life,"  and  it  was  an 
occasion  of  profound  feeling,  of  lofty  joy,  and  of  real 
refreshing. 

Each  locality  produced  its  little  school  of  "  prophets," 
doubtless  often  of  crude  and  commonplace  intelligence, 
but  with  some  evidence  of  anointing  and  able  to  utter  the 
"  word "  for  the  group.  It  was  a  bold  experiment  to 
dispense  utterly  and  completely  with  the  ordained  priest, 
the  professional  minister,  and  to  assume  that  all  men  were 
potentially  near  enough  to  God  to  be  their  own  priests, 
but  these  Friends  actually  tried  it.  It  gave  those  who 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      139 

formed  the  group  an  extraordinary  sense  of  spiritual 
dignity  and  a  no  less  important  consciousness  of  responsi 
bility.  A  person  was  no  longer  an  atom,  a  mere  individual, 
to  be  "  lost "  or  "  saved  "  by  a  system  ;  he  was  bound  in, 
vitally  and  organically,  into  the  life  above  and  the  life 
below — a  branch  of  God's  true  Vine  and  a  member  of  a 
spiritual  society  of  persons,  each  co-operating  for  the 
good  of  all,  and  each  a  possible  channel  of  grace  for 
the  rest. 

The  most  important  feature  of  "  the  meeting  "  was  the 
powerful  sense  of  reality  which  pervaded  it — the  peculiar 
conviction  which  possessed  the  members  of  the  group  that 
they  had  found  God.  They  were  no  longer  hearing  about 
Him  and  about  His  covenants  and  dispensations  in  past 
ages ;  their  own  hearts  were  burning  as  they  partook  of 
the  bread  which  He  broke  for  them  and  as  they  drank  at 
what  seemed  to  them  the  wells  of  eternal  life.  It  was 
this  assurance  of  reality,  this  exalting  experience,  which 
more  than  anything  else  propagated  primitive  Quakerism. 
The  arguments  "  about "  the  Inward  Light  were  much  on 
a  level  with  arguments  "  about "  covenants — both  moved 
in  the  realm  of  "  conceptions,"  but  the  man  who  had  felt 
his  soul  fed  in  such  a  meeting  was  "convinced,"  with  a 
permanent  conviction. 

Another  influence  which  powerfully  tended  to  foster 
common  ideals,  and  to  unify  the  group  in  spirit  and  aim, 
was  the  unbroken  stream  of  itinerant  ministry  from  the 
mother  Society  and  from  the  Societies  in  the  other 
Colonies.  The  minutes  of  the  meetings  show  an  amazing 
list  of  these  visitors.  When  one  remembers  the  difficulties 
of  travel,  the  expense  in  time  and  money,  the  primitive 
sort  of  entertainment  which  was  possible  at  this  period, 
the  element  of  sacrifice  looms  very  large  in  this  story  of 
travel  which  must  for  ever  remain  unwritten.  But  the 
point  of  importance  at  the  present  moment  is  the  formative 
influence  of  these  unique  travellers.  They  believed,  and 
their  listeners  believed,  that  they  were  "  divinely  sent 
messengers."  They  came  into  the  homes  of  the  native 
Friends  and  supplied  them  -with  the  facts,  the  news,  the 


140    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

personal  drama,  of  the  wider  Society  of  which  they  formed 
a  fragment.  By  word  of  mouth  those  of  all  sections 
heard  of  the  progress  of  events,  the  issues  before  the 
Society,  the  spread  of  "  Truth  "  as  they  called  it,1  and  they 
learned  to  know,  in  their  isolated  spot,  the  main  problems 
of  the  whole  movement,  which  they  thus  in  some  measure 
shared.  These  travellers  visited  every  region,  however 
remote,  and  they  were  thus  the  bearers  of  ideas  and  ideals 
which  formed  a  common  stock  of  thought  and  aspiration, 
and  without  knowing  it  the  native  ministers  shaped  their 
message  and  formed  their  manner  of  delivering  it  under 
the  unconscious  suggestions  supplied  by  their  visitors,  so 
that  the  Quaker  in  Dover  and  the  Quaker  in  Sandwich 
were  almost  as  alike  in  inward  tissue  as  they  were  out 
wardly  in  cut  of  coat ! 

But  the  greatest  socialising  influence,  and  next  to  the 
meeting  for  worship  the  most  creative  feature  of  the 
Quaker  organisation,  was  "  the  meeting  for  business."  In 
the  earliest  stage  "  the  business  meetings "  were  not 
clearly  differentiated,  as  they  later  came  to  be,  into 
Monthly,  Quarterly,  and  Yearly  Meetings.  At  first,  and 
for  some  years,  all  meetings  under  these  various  names 
were  primarily  enlarged  meetings  for  worship  and 
ministry — a  sort  of  "  general  meeting  "  drawing  attenders 
from  a  wider  territory  than  the  local  "  First  day  Meeting." 
The  "  business "  was  at  first  rather  meagre,  and  consisted 
mainly  of  accounts  of  sufferings  endured  and  reports  of 
what  was  being  done  to  spread  the  "  Truth." 2  The  novel 
feature  of  all  these  meetings,  from  lowest  to  highest,  was 
the  group-spirit  which  prevailed  in  them.  Each  individual 
Quaker  believed  in  divine  illumination  and  spiritual 
guidance — the  Light  of  Christ  within  him  was  the 
beginning  and  end  of  his  faith.  But  it  was  plain  to 
them  all  that  individuals  sometimes  erred  and  missed  the 

1  Even  the  horse  which  carried  the  ministers  from  place  to  place  was  called 
' '  Truth's  horse. " 

8  I  find  a  minute  of  Duxbury  Monthly  Meeting  as  late  as  1698  to  this  effect : 
' '  We  have  agreed  that  the  Monthly  Meeting  which  is  held  at  the  house  of  Robert 
Barker  in  Duxbury  shall  be  a  meeting  for  business  as  it  is  elsewhere  among 
Friends."  Evidently  before  this  it  had  been  a  general  meeting  for  worship  and 
extension.  This  was  later  called  Pembroke  Monthly  Meeting. 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      141 

Guide,  or,  as  an  ancient  minute  says,  "  ran  out  of  their 
measure  and  brought  death  instead  of  life ! "  It  would 
not  do — all  the  sound  Quaker  leaders  knew  this — to  call 
men  to  follow  their  inward  Light,  and  then  to  treat  them 
as  atoms  and  leave  them  to  go  their  individual  way 
according  to  the  suggestion  of  inward  impulse,  which 
might  be  from  above  and  might  also  be  from  below. 
They  went  to  work  with  fine  insight  and  with  wise 
instinct  to  mass  their  guidance  and  to  make  their 
spiritual  wisdom  a  corporate  affair.  Every  religious  meet 
ing  they  held  was  supposed  to  be  held  in  the  Light  of 
Christ,  and  the  exercises  of  it  were  supposed  to  move 
in  response  to  the  will  of  the  Spirit,  and  each  member 
found  his  own  particular  part  and  place  by  being  organic 
with  the  whole.  So,  too,  with  the  "  business  "  of  monthly, 
quarterly,  and  yearly  meetings.  Each  decision  was  reached 
by  taking  the  "sense"  or  "judgment"  of  the  whole 
meeting,  and  each  such  conclusion  was  supposed  to  be 
under  divine  guidance,  and  was  arrived  at  only  in  the 
unity  of  the  body.  From  first  to  last  the  group  was 
the  unit>  and  the  individual  found  his  life  and  his 
leading  in  the  Life  and  Light  of  the  formative  spiritual 
group. 

Loosely  organised  local  meetings  for  business  were 
held  as  early  as  1658  in  Sandwich  and  Newport,  a  little 
later  in  Scituate,  Duxbury,1  Salem,  and  Lynn,  with 
others  following  soon  after,  but  no  meeting  records 
survive  for  a  date  earlier  than  167  3.*  The  Quarterly 

1  There  is  on  record  an  order  of  the  court  held  in  Duxbury  in  1660  :   ' '  Whereas 
there  is  a  constant  monthly  meeting  of  Quakers  from  divers  places  in  great  number, 
which  is  very  offensive  and  may  prove  very  prejudicial  to  the  government,  and  as 
the  most  constant  place  for  such  meetings  is  Duxburrow,  they  have  ordered 
Constant  Southworth  and  William  Paybody  to  repair  to  such  meetings,  together 
with  the  marshall  or  constable  of  the  town,  and  use  their  best  endeavours  by 
discourse  and  argument  to  convince  or  hinder  them. " — Records  of  Plymouth  Colony, 
vol.  xi.  p.  130. 

2  The  Records  of  American  meetings  were  undoubtedly  begun  at  the  suggestion 
of  George  Fox.     This  is  the  first  entry  in  the  Sandwich  Book  of  Records  :  "  At  a 
man's  Meeting  kept  at  Will.  Allen's  house  ye  25th  day  of  ye  4th  mo.   [June, 
by  our  modern  calendar]  1673.     At  wch.  Meeting  it  is  concluded  yt.  for  ye 
future  a  man's  Meeting  be  kept  ye  first  sixth  day  of  ye  week  in  every  month, 
and  for  Friends  to  come  together  about  ye  eleventh  hour."     The  Rhode  Island 
Records  begin  in  1676.     The  following  Monthly  Meetings  were  established  in 
New  England  in  the  Colonial  period  : 


142    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Meeting,  as  its  name  implies,  was  held  four  times  in  the 
year,  and  in  the  earliest  period  it  was  a  distinctly  religious 
meeting.1 

It  massed  together  in  a  definite  community  the 
Quaker  forces  spread  over  a  large  area  of  country,  and  it 
was  held  mainly  for  the  purpose  of  propagating  the 
Quaker  message — "the  Truth,"  as  they  insisted.  There 
was  often  a  distinguished  visitor  or  visitors  present,  and 
those  who  came  were  likely  to  hear  the  Friends'  interpre 
tation  of  Christianity  powerfully  presented.  It  was  also 
the  custom  to  read  on  these  occasions  epistles  containing 
a  message  of  Truth  from  other  meetings,  or  from  some 
prominent  Friend  who  had  formerly  visited  them  and  had 
"  a  concern  for  their  advancement  in  the  Truth."  It  was, 
too,  quite  the  custom  to  hold  special  meetings  for 
"youth,"  at  which  epistles,  or  passages  from  Friends' 
writings  were  read  and  advice  "  in  the  way  of  life  "  given.2 
These  Quarterly  Meetings  gradually  developed  into 
meetings  for  the  transaction  of  business,  and  matters 
concerning  the  wider  life  of  the  Church,  too  weighty  to  be 
settled  in  a  local  monthly  meeting,  came  up  here  for 
consideration.  The  building  of  meeting-houses  and  the 
raising  of  money  for  extensive  relief  would  come  before 


Sandwich  in  1658  :  Records  begin 

1673. 
Rhode  Island  in  1658  :    Records 

begin  1676. 
Pembroke  before  1660  :    Records 

from  1676. 
Salem,  date  of  origin  unknown : 

Records  begin  1677. 
Dartmouth,  1699. 


East  Greenwich,  1699. 

Hampton  (later  Amesbury),  1701. 

Dover,  1701. 

Nan  tucket,  1708. 

Providence  and  Smithfield,  1718. 

Swanzea,  1732. 

South  Kingstown,  1743. 

Yarmouth,  Maine,  1761. 

Westport,  1766. 


1  After  the  Quarterly  Meeting  differentiated  into  a  distinct  business  meeting, 
there  were  three  Quarterly  Meetings   in   the  colonial  period,  as  follows:    (i) 
Sandwich  Quarterly  Meeting,  which  began  at  least  as  early  as  1680  and  originally 
was   composed   of  Sandwich    and    Pembroke    Monthly  Meetings.     (2)  Rhode 
Island  Quarterly  Meeting,  which  was  established  in   1699,  and  was  originally 
composed  of  Rhode  Island,  Dartmouth,  and  Kingstown  Monthly  Meetings.     (3) 
Salem   Quarterly   Meeting,  which  was  established  in  1705  and  was  originally 
composed  of  Salem,  Hampton,  and  Dover  Monthly  Meetings. 

2  I  find  on  the  Monthly  Meeting  Records  for  Newport  this  minute  under  date  of 
izth  mo.  14,  1692  :   "  It  is  agreed  that  all  our  public  Meetings  be  at  our  Meeting 
houses  as  formerly  were  held.      Our  Quarterly  Meeting  was  for  the  reading  of 
Friends'  epistles  ;  but  there  is  now  a  Meeting  once  in  six  weeks  for  that  service." 
The  Quarterly  Meeting  also  prepared,  "as  way  opened  for  it,"  epistles  to  be  sent 
to  other  Quarterly  Meetings.     I  find  distinct  reference  to  this  service  in  the 
minutes. 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      143 

the  Quarterly  Meeting.1  There  is  a  record  of  an  extra 
ordinary  Quarterly  Meeting  held  in  Sandwich,  "  in  Wm. 
Allen's  house,"  in  1703,  with  representatives  from  meet 
ings  reaching  all  the  way  from  Rhode  Island  to  Dover, 
New  Hampshire.2 

The  reader  who  has  imagination  will  easily  see  the 
social  importance  of  these  gatherings.  Friends  from 
these  widely  sundered  regions,  persons  of  different  social 
standing,  of  all  stages  of  education  and  spiritual  experience, 
thus  came  together,  generally  for  a  two  days'  meeting- 
were  entertained  at  the  homes  in  the  locality  where  the 
meeting  was  held,  interchanged  ideas,  and  formed,  almost 
without  knowing  it,  a  "  group-consciousness  "  which  played 
a  powerful  r61e  in  the  life  of  the  Society.  More 
important  than  the  "  youths'  meetings  "  in  their  formative 
influence  over  the  children  were  these  social  visits  and 
these  Quarterly  Meeting  dinners,  when  the  house  was 
filled  to  bursting  with  Friends  from  other  sections  of  the 
Colony.3 

Still  higher  in  its  scope  and  more  constructive  in  its 
functions  was  the  Yearly  Meeting,  and  this  again  was  still 
more  significant  for  its  influence  in  the  formation  of 
"  group-consciousness "  and  of  social  ideals.  As  with 
the  other  meetings,  the  Yearly  Meeting  was  at  first  a 
large  General  Meeting  for  worship  and  preaching,  and  for 
an  impressive  massing  of  the  Quaker  forces.  The  first  of 

1  Where  the  need  was  extensive  the  case  was  brought  up  to  the  Yearly  Meet 
ing,  as  will  be  seen  from  the  following  minute  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  of  1697  :  "It 
was  proposed  to  this  Meeting  the  necessity  of  poor  Friends  to  the  Eastward  [New 
Hampshire  and  Maine,  I  presume]  for  some  relief :  this  Meeting  did  collect  ye  sum 
pff  ten  pounds,  and  did  order  ye  same  by  ye  hands  off  Samuel  Collings  to  Matthew 
and  Richard  Estes  to  be  distributed  by  ym. 

"  Itt  is  desired  by  this  Meeting  yt  ye  ffriends  appointed  to  write  to  ffriends  in 
England  doe  also  write  to  ffriends  in  Long  Island,  East  and  West  Jersey,  and  to 
Philadelphia,  conserning  ye  necessytie  off  poor  ffriends  to  ye  Eastward,  and  desire 
their  assistance  to  help  relieve  them." 

2  The  following  localities  sent  representatives  : 


Rhode  Island  Meeting. 
Dartmouth 
Salem  and  Lynn 
Scituate 


Sandwich  Meeting. 
Greenwich       , , 
Hampton         ,, 
Dover 


8  As  late  even  as  1784  there  were  only  three  Quarterly  Meetings  for  business 
established.  They  were  (i)  Rhode  Island,  which  was  held  in  turn  at  Smithfield, 
Dartmouth,  Swansea,  and  Greenwich ;  (2)  Salem,  held  at  Falmouth  in  Maine, 
Dover,  Hampton,  Salem  ;  (3)  Sandwich,  held  at  Nantucket,  Long  Plain,  Falmouth 
in  Massachusetts,  and  Sandwich. 


144    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

these  Yearly  Meetings  was  held  at  Newport,  Rhode  Island, 
in  1 66 1.  It  seems  to  have  been  called  at  the  suggestion 
of  an  English  Quaker,  named  George  Rofe,  who  was  at 
that  time  on  a  religious  mission  to  this  country.  He 
writes  to  his  friend  Richard  Hubberthorne  in  1661  : 

"We  came  in  at  Rhode  Island,  and  we  appointed  a  General 
Meeting  for  all  Friends  in  those  parts,  which  was  a  very  great 
meeting  and  very  precious,  and  continued  four  days."  l 

This  meeting  was  so  large  that,  according  to  Bishop, 
the  Boston  officials,  "  made  an  alarm  that  the  Quakers 
were  gathering  to  kill  the  people  and  fire  the  town  of 
Boston  !  "  It  steadily  grew  in  importance  and  in  numbers, 
and  soon  came  to  be  the  great  event  in  the  Quaker  year. 
From  far  away  Piscataqua  at  one  extreme,  and  from  Long 
Island  at  the  other,  the  Friends  flocked  to  Newport,  for 
until  1695  the  Quakers  on  Long  Island  came  to  Rhode 
Island  to  Yearly  Meeting.2  By  1743  it  was  attended  by 
five  thousand  Friends,  and  the  attendance  continued  very 
large  throughout  the  century.  Similar  Yearly  Meetings 
were  held  for  many  years  in  different  sections  of  New 
England  as  well  as  at  Newport,  so  that  nearly  all  com 
munities  where  Friends  abounded  had  a  large  annual 
visitation.8  But  the  Newport  Yearly  Meeting  was  "  the 

1  Letter  of  George  Rofe  to  Richard  Hubberthorne,  i8th  November  1661,  in 
the  A.  R.  B.  Collection,  No.  62,  Devonshire  House  Portfolio. 

2  "  It  is  also  agreed  yt  ye  Meeting  at  Long  Island  shall  be  from  this  time  a 
Yearly  Meeting,  and  yt  John  Boune  and  John  Rodman  shall  receive  all  such  as 
shall  come  to  ye  Yearly  Meeting  in  Long  Island,  and  correspond  with  ffriends 
appointed  in  London." — Minute  of  New  England  Yearly  Meeting  for  1695. 

3  I  find  the  following  Yearly  Meetings  in  existence  under  date  of  1693  : 

"  Duxberry  Yearly  Meeting  of  Worship  begins  ye  furst  6th  day  in  every  8th  mo. 

"Salem,  ye  generall  Meeting  of  Worship  begins  ye  first  and  second  days  of 
every  7th  month. 

1 '  Piscattua  ( Piscataqua)  Yearly  Generall  Meeting  of  Worship  begins  ye  7th 
ffirst  day  after  Salem  Meeting. 

' '  Dartmouth  Yearly  Generall  Meeting  of  Worship  begins  the  4th  sixth  day  in 
every  8th  month. 

"Warwick  Yearly  Generall  Meeting  of  worship  begins  and  is  appointed  ye 
second  ffirst  day  in  every  3d  moth. 

' '  Providence  Yearly  Generall  Meeting  of  Worship  begins  ye  last  ffirst  day  of  the 
5th  moth. 

"  4th  mo.  14,  1695. — There  shall  be  kept  a  Meeting  at  Lin  [Lynn],  ye  third 
day  next  after  ye  Yearly  Meeting  at  Salem  is  over." 

Samuel  Bownas  says  :  ' '  They  [the  Friends  of  New  England]  have  in  almost 
every  place  once  a  year  a  General  Meeting  which  they  call  a  Yearly  Meeting,  and 
by  this  popular  abundance  more  people  come  together  in  expectation  of  something 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      145 

child   of  promise "  and    soon  outstripped   and   gradually 
swallowed  up  the  others.1 

Definite  arrangements  were  made  in  1699  for  Repre 
sentatives  to  the  Yearly  Meeting  from  the  Quarterly 
Meetings,  and  from  this  time  on  the  legislative  and  con 
structive  aspect  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  became  more 
pronounced,  and  less  emphasis  was  put  upon  it  as  an 
occasion  for  worship  and  ministry.2 

The  Monthly  Meeting,  beginning  as  we  have  seen  in 
a  very  unassuming  fashion,  soon  expanded  in  importance, 
and  came  to  have  a  profoundly  formative  social  influence 
over  the  life  of  the  individual  members,  and  it  absorbed 
into  the  corporate  body  of  the  meeting  the  functions  of 
"  cure  of  souls  "  and  guardian  of  morals — usually  delegated 
by  the  Churches  to  a  priest  or  an  ordained  clergyman. 
From  the  earliest  period  of  the  systematic  Monthly 
Meeting  it  was  the  custom  to  read,  in  a  solemn  way, 
a  set  of  "  Advices,"  embodying  the  religious  ideals  of 
the  Quaker  founders,  and  setting  forth  the  type  of  "  walk 
and  conversation "  which  befitted  a  Friend.3  To  these 

extraordinary  to  be  met  with." — Life  and  Travels  of  Samuel  Bownas  (London, 
1761),  p.  149. 

1  I  find  a  record  of  a  Yearly  Meeting  at  Sandwich  as  late  as  1756,  and  this 
curious  minute  arranging  for  the  holding  of  Providence  Yearly  Meeting  : 

6th  mo.  ii,  1761. — "  By  epistle  from  Rhode  Island  Quarterly  Meeting,  inform 
ing  us  they  have  Providence  Yearly  Meeting  altered  to  begin  at  Warwick  the  sixth 
day  before  the  fourth  First  day  of  ye  8th  month,  and  at  Providence  the  Seventh 
day  following,  and  at  Smithfield  on  First  day.  For  divers  reasons  offerde  at  this 
Meeting  it  is  agreed  that  said  Meeting  for  the  future  be  altered  agreeable  to 
their  request." 

2  "  Itt  is  agreed  by  order  and  consent  of  this  Meeting,  yt  the  second  day  of 
the  week  be  for  the  business  and  service  of  the  Meeting  for  the  future,  according 
to  the  antient  order  of  Truth  amongst  us,  and  not  for  public  worship,  and  yt  two 
ffriends  from  each  Quarterly  Meeting,  and  where  no  Quarterly  Meeting  two  or 
more  from  each  Monthly  Meeting,  to  attend  ye  service  of  ye  Yearly  Meeting  till 
business  is  ended,  and  as  many  other  sober  friends  as  hath  freedom. " — Yearly 
Meeting  Minutes  for  1699. 

The  meeting  of  the  ministers,  as  a  meeting  apart,  began  in  1700  under  the 
following  minute  : 

4th  mo.  17,  1700. — "  It  is  agreed  upon  by  this  Meeting  yt  ye  sixth  day  morning 
of  ye  Yearly  Meeting  before  ye  public  Meeting  for  Worship  begins  be  for  ye  future 
for  Friends  of  ye  Ministry  to  meet  together,  and  such  other  sober  Friends  as  hath 
freedom. " 

3  The  following  minute  of  Sandwich  Monthly  Meeting  for  Eleventh  month, 
8th,  1680,  indicates  that  the  "Advices"  were  at  this  time  read  four  times  a  year. 
They  are  called   "The  testimonies  of  Truth's  concern."     At  this  Meeting  it  is 
ordered  ' '  yt  the  testimonies  of  Truth's  concern  are  to  be  read  four  times  in  a  year 
at  our  Monthly  Men  and  Women's  Meeting." 

L 


146    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

"  Advices  "  there  was  added,  at  least  as  early  as  the  year 
1700,  a  set  of  definite  "Queries,"  the  reading  of  which 
was  intended  to  furnish  the  members  an  occasion  for 
inward  silent  "  confessional." 1  The  "  Queries  "  called  for 
an  examination  of  the  life  from  at  least  a  dozen  moral 
and  spiritual  view-points,  and  tended  to  present  a  concrete 
moral  ideal  for  the  daily  life  at  home  and  in  business 
occupations.  When  the  "  Advices  "  and  "  Queries  "  were 
read  the  Friends  "  of  light  and  leading,"  especially  visiting 
Friends  from  abroad,  used  the  opportunity  for  imparting 
counsel  and  advice  upon  practical  matters  of  life  among 
men.  There  can  be  no  question  that  all  this,  presented 
as  it  was  with  religious  atmosphere  and  with  all  minds  in 
a  peculiarly  receptive  attitude,  worked  with  deep  suggestive 
power  and  tended  to  produce  a  common  moral  type. 
But  the  Monthly  Meeting  did  not  stop  with  public 
"  Queries,"  and  with  its  admirable  method  of  "  group 
suggestion,"  it  brought  positive  pressure  to  bear  to  mould 
the  lives  of  the  individual  into  the  moral  fashion  which 
the  group  approved.  For  this  purpose  there  were  "  Over 
seers,"  who  visited  the  homes  and  kept  a  careful  watch 
over  the  lives  of  the  members. 

There  was,  as  we  should  expect,  a  tendency  to  make 
conduct  conform  to  rather  stiff  and  rigid  standards,  for 
the  Friends  to  a  large  degree  shared  the  Puritan  ideals  in 
regard  to  "  Christian  manners  in  the  world."  Then,  too, 
in  addition  to  their  scrupulous  guardianship  over  morals, 
they  were  always  as  zealous  to  maintain  certain  "  testi 
monies  "  which  were  the  badges  of  their  "  peculiarity  "  as 
a  people  of  the  Lord.  They  were  as  keen  and  watchful 
for  deviations  from  these  "  testimonies "  as  the  Puritan 
elders  were  over  deviations  from  sound  theology,  for  that 
larger  liberty  which  leaves  the  individual  entirely  with 
his  own  conscience — with  his  personal  sense  of  what  is 

1  I  find  this  minute  in  the  Records  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  for  1701 :  "  Twelve 
Queries  were  made  at  the  Quarterly  and  Monthly  Meetings  and  sent  to  the 
Yearly  Meeting."  Before  this  time  a  set  of  Queries  prepared  by  George  Fox  had 
been  extensively  used.  I  find  this  entry  in  the  Sandwich  minutes  under  date  of 
1673  :  "I*  was  ordered  that  Jedediah  Allen  pay  John  Fowler  5  sh.  for  copying 
G.  ff.  Queries. "  The  custom  of  preparing  set  answers  to  the  ' '  Queries  "  began 
in  I7SS- 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      147 

right  for  him — had  not  yet  come.  The  "  minutes  "  of  all 
types  of  meetings,  from  their  origin,  indicate  a  highly 
developed  moral  sensitiveness,  and,  all  interwoven  with  this, 
there  appears  an  excessive  concern  over  things  which 
were  in  the  class  of  the  ceremonial,  i.e.  things  which  had 
a  function  only  as  they  helped  form  a  "  peculiar  people."  * 

One  of  the  matters  which  most  profoundly  concerned 
these  Friends  was  the  guardianship  of  the  marriage  of 
their  members.  They  refused  from  the  very  beginning 
to  allow  any  member  to  be  married  by  what  they  called 
"  a  priest,"  for  this  seemed  to  them  to  be  the  very  essence 
of  sacerdotalism.  They  adopted  a  simple  ceremony  by 
which  the  bride  and  groom  pledged  themselves  in  marriage 
"  before  the  Lord  and  in  the  presence  of  Friends  "  ;  and 
after  enduring  many  hardships  they  won  from  the  courts 
the  decision  that  this  form  of  marriage  was  legal.  As 
the  idea  developed  that  Friends  were  "  a  peculiar  people 
of  the  Lord,"  there  naturally  went  with  it  a  disapproval 
of  the  marriage  of  a  Friend  with  "  a  person  of  the  world." 
This  soon  became  a  fixed  idea,  and  the  monthly  meeting 
records  contain  a  host  of  minutes  which  report  "  dealings  " 
with  members  who  have  deviated  in  this  all -important 
matter  of  marriage. 

In  regard  to  the  prevailing  "  vices "  of  the  times 
Friends  appear  generally  to  have  taken  an  advanced 
position.  When  lotteries  were  looked  upon  by  almost 
all  Christian  people  as  at  least  tolerable  institutions,  and 

1  I  give  two  illustrations  of  the  way  meetings  "  watched  up  "  their  members  on 
matters  of  daily  life :  ' '  The  overseers  inform  this  Meeting  that  two  Friends  have 
allowed  fiddling,  dancing,  and  playing  at  cards  in  their  houses,  for  which  they 
decline  to  condemn  the  offence  to  Friends'  satisfaction.  Therefore  this  Meeting 
doth  appoint  Joseph  Gifford  and  Barzellai  Tucker  to  labour  with  them  and  make 
report  to  the  next  Monthly  Meeting."  "This  Meeting  having  considered  the 
answers  of  the  several  Quarterly  Meetings  relating  to  the  extravigant  and 
unnecessary  Perry  Wiggs,  and  a  concern  remaining  on  the  minds  of  Friends  for 
preventing  the  same  prevailing  among  us  Do  conclude,  and  it  is  the  judgment 
of  this  Meeting  that  all  Friends  who  suppose  that  they  have  need  of  wiggs,  ought 
to  take  the  advice  and  approbation  of  the  visitors  [i.e.  overseers]  of  their  respective 
Meetings  before  they  proceed  to  get  one.  And  it  is  the  tender  advice,  and 
brotherly  request  of  this  Meeting  that  all  be  careful  to  observe  the  same,  and  not 
in  a  careless  or  overly-minded  cutt  of  their  hair  (which  is  given  for  a  covering)  to 
putt  on  a  wigg  or  indecent  capp  which  has  been  observed  of  late  years  to  be 
a  growing  practice  among  too  many  of  the  young  men  in  several  parts,  to  the 
troubel  of  many  honest  Friends,  it  plainly  appearing  (in  some)  for  an  imitation 
and  joyning  with  the  spirit  and  fashion  of  the  world." 


148    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

were  being  used  by  churches  and  educational  institutions 
as  a  beneficial  provision  for  raising  funds  for  the  work 
of  the  Lord,  New  England  Friends,  "  in  the  light  of 
Truth,"  saw  that  they  were  pernicious,  and  refused  to 
allow  their  members  to  profit  by  them.  This  minute  from 
Dartmouth  Meeting  shows  the  prevailing  sentiment  among 
Friends  as  early  as  1759. 

"  Whereas  we  understand  that  there  has  been  a  practice  of 
late  amongst  our  younger  set  of  people  of  making  lotteries  which 
we  think  to  be  of  very  hurtful  consequence,  therefore,  it  is  the 
advice  of  this  Meeting  for  all  under  our  care  to  be  careful  not  to 
be  in  such  practice,  and  that  all  Friends  belonging  to  this 
Meeting  endeavour  to  suppress  the  same."  l 

At  a  time  when  the  use  of  spirituous  liquors  was  an 
almost  universal  custom,  Friends  were  nevertheless  very 
sensitive  on  the  subject.  They  began,  from  the  first  of 
their  existence  as  a  people,  to  insist  on  a  clean,  temperate 
life  for  their  members.  The  Minutes  of  all  the  monthly 
meetings  from  1673  down  contain  many  items  like 
this  : — 

"  A  Friend  of  Richmond  Meeting  hath  taken  strong  liquor 
to  excess,  a  committee  is  appointed  to  labour  with  him." 

"A  complaint  was  brought  against  a  Friend  for  excessive 
drinking,  this  meeting  appoints  two  Friends  to  discourse  with 
said  Friend." 

"  The  overseers  inform  that  a  Friend  hath  suffered  too  much 
liberty  in  his  tavern  which  tends  to  bring  a  reproach  on  Truth, 
wherefore  Joseph  Tucker  and  Abraham  Tucker  are  appointed  to 
labour  with  him."  2 

1  A  little  later  horse-racing  was  included  in  the  list  of  "vices"  which  could 
not  be  tolerated  as  the  following  minute  shows  : 

"  2/15/1762. — Whereas  we  understand  that  horse-racing  is  a  prevailing  practice 
therefore  the  Meeting  doth  conclude  to  make  a  minute  against  all  such  practices. 
And  if  Friends  are  found  guilty  of  any  such  practice  they  are  liable  to  be  dealt 
with  as  offenders." 

2  I  find  in  the  Records  of  the  Yearly  Meeting   for   1784  a  minute  on  the 
subject  which  seems  to  me  a  noble  paper  for  the  eighteenth   century   to  have 
produced.      ' '  The  excessive  use  of  Spirituous  liquors  of  all  kinds  has  for  a  long 
time  been  seen  by  our  Society  to  be  a  practice  tending  to  lead  from  calmness  and 
innocency  to  the  many  evils  which  are  the  consequences  of  intemperance,  and 
a  concern  having  arisen   for  the  spreading  of  this  Testimony,   not  only  to  the 
disuse  of  distilled  spirituous  liquors  amongst  us  except  as  a  medicine,  but  that 
others  also  may  by  our  example  be  encouraged  to  restrain  its  use  within  the 
limits  of  Truth,  we  recommend  to  all  Friends  everywhere,  carefully  to  look  at 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      149 

Fidelity  to  one's  word  of  promise  was  held  to  be 
a  most  sacred  obligation,  and  every  Friend  was  expected 
to  make  righteousness  in  trade  and  dealing  "  an  affair  of 
honour."  Every  book  of  Monthly  Meeting  Records  has 
many  minutes  similar  in  spirit  to  the  following : 

"  There  was  a  complaint  brought  up  that  a  Friend  refuses  to 
fulfil  a  promise  he  made  two  years  ago  respecting  performing  of 
his  proportion  of  work  on  the  high  ways,  therefore,  in  con 
sequence  of  said  complaint  we  do  appoint  John  Gifford, 
Benjamin  Tripp,  and  Peleg  Huddestone  to  inspect  into  said 
complaint,  and  if  they  find  the  Friend  refuse  to  fulfil  his  promise 
agreeable  to  said  complaint,  to  labour  with  said  Friend  to  fulfil 
it,  so  that  Truth  and  the  professors  thereof  may  not  suffer  on 
that  account  any  longer." 

"  There  was  brought  a  complaint  to  this  Meeting  against 
a  Friend  for  refusing  to  come  to  a  settlement  in  a  division  of 
a  fence  in  the  line  between  him  and  another  Friend,  therefore 
we  do  appoint  Nicholas  Haviland  and  James  Soule  to  labour 
with  said  Friend  to  do  what  they  shall  think  reasonable  in  the 
case  after  they  have  informed  themselves  the  circumstances 
thereof." 

"  The  overseers  informed  that  there  is  a  bad  report  concern 
ing  two  members  salting  up  beef,  and  exposing  it  for  sale,  which 
was  not  merchantable ;  and  they  have  made  some  inquiry,  and 
do  not  find  things  clear,  therefore  this  Meeting  appoints  a 
committee  to  make  inquiry." 

Under  no  consideration  or  provocation  might  a  Friend 
take  an  oath,  either  as  an  "  expletive "  to  relieve  his 
mind,  or  as  a  judicial  sign  that  he  was  about  to  tell  the 
truth  and  nothing  but  the  truth,  for  he  was  under  a  sacred 
obligation  to  make  his  ordinary  word  as  true  as  a  bond. 
In  Rhode  Island  this  was  an  easy  matter,  as  the  statutes 
of  that  Colony  always  made  provision  for  an  affirmation 

the  motives  of  being  concerned  therewith  not  only  for  using,  but  distilling, 
importing,  trading,  or  handing  out  to  others,  who  from  habit  may  have  acquired 
a  thirst,  and  inclination  after  it,  tending  to  their  hurt  ;  we  tenderly  advise  all 
such  as  are  concerned  therein,  to  centre  down  to  the  principle,  leading  to  universal 
righteousness,  and  as  we  apprehend  a  continuance  in  such  practices,  will  in  this 
day  of  light  weaken  the  hands  not  only  of  those  individuals  concerned  to  further 
the  reformation,  but  tend  greatly  to  obstruct  Society  from  holding  up  a  standard 
to  this  important  Testimony,  as  becometh  our  holy  profession.  We  entreat, 
therefore,  those  who  have  begun  well,  and  made  advances  in  the  way  towards 
their  own  peace,  that  as  soon  as  may  be,  they  forbear  the  said  practices  that  a  line 
may  in  due  time  be  drawn,  and  the  standard  be  raised  and  spread  to  the  nation. 


ISO    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  i 

instead  of  an  oath,  but  this  provision  was  not  made  in 
Massachusetts  until  1759. 

Friends  felt  that  it  was  even  more  important  to  keep 
the  Society  absolutely  clear  of  everything  that  belonged 
to  warfare,  or  which  encouraged  fighting  with  what  were 
known  as  "  carnal  weapons,"  for  the  Quaker  had  no 
objection  to  any  warfare  which  he  could  properly  call 
"  spiritual "  !  This  "  concern  "  ran  up  against  a  deep- 
seated  natural  instinct,  and  it  entailed,  of  course,  a  harvest 
of  difficulties,  particularly  in  the  early  days  of  Indian 
warfare. 

During  the  French  and  Indian  War  of  Queen  Anne's 
reign  Friends  were  subjected  to  very  severe  sufferings, 
and  stringent  measures  were  taken  to  force  them  at  this 
time  to  do  military  service.1 

At  the  time  of  the  Louisburg  Expedition  in  the  campaign 
of  1758-59  the  Quakers  in  Massachusetts  were  forced  to 
hire  men  to  go  as  substitutes  ;  and  when  they  refused  to 
pay  for  substitutes,  as  they  generally  did,  their  property 
was  distrained  to  cover  the  amount.  Moses  Farnum  of 
Uxbridge,  Massachusetts,  in  1759  headed  a  petition  to 
the  Legislature  setting  forth  that  the  sums  assessed 
against  the  Quakers  were  greatly  in  excess  of  the  actual 
amounts  paid  for  their  substitutes.  On  investigation  this 
was  found  to  be  true,  and  large  sums  were  returned  to  the 
Friends  who  had  suffered.2  The  difficulty  of  being  a 
"  consistent  Friend  "  in  the  critical  period  of  the  Revolu 
tionary  War  was,  of  course,  even  greater,  for  now  the 
Quaker  testimony  came  into  violent  collision  with  the 

1  The  following  minute  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  for  1712  gives  a  glimpse  of  the 
situation :- — 

"4/12/1712. — At  our  Generall  Yearly  Meeting  held  at  Portsmouth.  Peter 
Varney  and  John  Kenny  were  imprisoned  ye  8th  day  of  5th  month  1711  to  go 
in  ye  expidition  to  Canada,  and  remained  under  confinment  until  ye  8th  month 
1711  being  under  ye  command  of  Sydrach  Walton  who  suffered  them  not  to  be 
abused  during  the  time  of  their  voyage  as  per  account  brought  into  this  meeting. 

' '  John  Terry  and  Moses  Tucker  were  likewise  imprisoned  to  go  on  ye  said 
expidition  to  Canada,  and  being  in  hopes  of  getting  discharged  went  to  Boston,  and 
after  much  labour  thereabouts  were  nevertheless  sent  as  prisoners  to  the  castle  at 
Boston,  and  from  thence  conveyed  by  force  on  board  Transport  under  ye  command 
of  Major  Roberton,  whose  hard  usage  was  such  that  one  of  ye  above  Ffriends  (John 
Terry)  died  within  twenty-four  hours  after  their  return  to  Boston,  as  may  be  seen 
by  a  particular  account  thereof  presented  to  this  Meeting." 

8  See  Provincial  Laws  of  Massachusetts,  xvi.  488  and  521. 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      151 

fundamental  instinct  of  patriotism.  There  was,  however, 
no  parley  on  the  part  of  the  Meetings — principle  was 
principle — and  no  man  could  remain  a  Friend  if  he 
participated  "  in  the  spirit  of  war."  Even  so  blue-blooded 
a  Friend  as  Nathanael  Greene  of  Rhode  Island — a  patriot 
of  the  patriots — had  his  name  expunged  from  the  list  of 
members  for  the  offence  of  "  taking  arms."  It  was  when 
the  colonies  were  face  to  face  with  this  war  with  the 
mother  country  in  1775  that  New  England  Friends  first 
organised  a  meeting  distinctly  called  "  The  Meeting  for 
Sufferings,"  composed  of  delegates  from  all  sections  and 
designed  to  deal  with  the  difficulties  likely  to  arise  from 
the  approaching  catastrophe  of  war.1 

The  work  of  oversight  was  not  confined  to  moral  and 
spiritual  matters.  It  touched  the  whole  of  life.  The 
most  important  aspect  of  it  from  a  social  point  of  view 
was  the  care  bestowed  upon  those  who  were  in  trouble  or 
in  financial  straits.  It  belonged  to  the  sacred  "  honour  of 
Truth  "  that  no  Friend  should  be  allowed  to  suffer  want, 
or  should  be  compelled  to  receive  support  from  the  town 
ship.  The  amount  of  time  which  some  of  these  capable 
and  practical  Friends  must  have  spent  in  looking  after 
the  needs  of  poor  members  gives  one  a  very  wholesome 
respect  for  the  sincerity  of  their  Christianity.2  In  times 
of  general  calamity,  widespread  suffering,  or  the  havoc  of 
war,  the  Meetings  which  were  less  exposed  raised  large 
sums  of  money  for  the  relief  of  suffering  Friends  and  for 
others.  This  outreaching  relief  work  was  carried  on 
throughout  the  entire  period  of  this  history  ;  but  it  finds  its 
best  illustration  in  the  effort  of  Friends  to  relieve  the 
sufferings  which  resulted  from  the  siege  of  Boston  during 

1  This  Meeting  for  Sufferings  eventually  took  on  a  great  variety  of  functions, 
and  managed  the  important  public  affairs  of  the  Society  in  the  interim  between 
Yearly  Meetings. 

2  This  Minute  will  illustrate  what  was  happening  in  every  Quaker  community  : 
' '  And  whereas  there  has  been  a  great  charge  arisen  upon  a  man  Friend  by  reason 
of  his  lameness,  and  Doctor's  charges,  we  think  it  our  duty  to  see  into  the  affair, 
and  order  Abram  Tucker,  Isaac  Smith,  and  Peleg  Russell  to  see  what  ye  charge 
is,  and  what  way  he  is  to  pay  it." 

• '  We  cannot  find  that  the  man  Friend  can  do  anything  valuable  towards  pay 
ing  the  Doctor  for  curing  his  leg.  The  charge  is  ^15,  143.  lawful  money  which 
this  Meeting  hath  concluded  to  pay." 


152    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

the  Revolutionary  War.  An  appeal  was  made  to  Friends 
in  Pennsylvania  and  New  Jersey  to  join  in  these  extensive 
relief  measures,  and  the  extraordinary  sum  of  nineteen 
hundred  and  sixty-eight  pounds  sterling  was  expended 
under  the  care  of  a  committee  of  the  Meeting  for  Suffer 
ings.  This  committee  visited  General  Washington  and 
General  Howe,  explaining  that  their  mission  was  visiting 
the  fatherless  and  widows,  feeding  the  hungry,  clothing 
the  naked,  without  distinction  of  sects  or  parties.  The 
Generals  would  not  allow  the  Friends  to  pass  through  the 
lines  into  the  city  of  Boston,  but  arrangements  were  made 
for  them  to  send  in  their  funds  to  be  distributed  by 
Friends  who  were  shut  up  in  the  besieged  city.  The 
members  of  the  committee  then  took  up  in  person  the 
laborious  task  of  relieving  the  distress — as  a  kind  of 
eighteenth  century  Red  Cross  Society — in  the  towns 
about  the  city,  where  multitudes  of  people  "  were  in  want 
of  victuals,  wood,  and  clothing."  In  Salem,  for  instance, 
the  Friends,  in  company  with  the  Selectmen  of  the  town, 
went  from  house  to  house  and  distributed  their  relief 
through  the  very  streets  along  which  Quakers  had  been 
whipped  a  hundred  years  before.  There  stands  on  the 
Records  of  the  town  of  Salem  for  1775,  and  again  in 
1776,  a  "vote  of  thanks"  to  the  Friends  for  their 
generous  relief  in  this  time  of  need.1  The  towns  which 
were  visited  and  relieved  in  like  manner,  were  Lynn, 
Marblehead,  Charleston,  Medfield,  Bolton,  Lancaster, 
Marlborough,  Sudbury,  Weston,  Woburn,  Reading, 
Sherbdrn,  Holliston,  Northbury,  and  Waltham,  and 
through  these  towns — many  of  them  towns  through 
which  Quakers  had  been  whipped — working  in  company 
with  the  Selectmen,  the  Friends,  with  personal  painstaking 
care,  dispensed  their  gifts  of  love.2 

One  of  the  most  stubborn  fights  in  the  spiritual  war 
fare  of  the  New  England  Quakers  was  for  freedom  to 
worship  God  as  their  own  hearts  dictated,  a  privilege 
now  common  to  all  Anglo-Saxon  peoples,  and  also  for 

1  See  Annals  of  Salem,  ii.  399. 

a  The  full  accounts  of  this  work  are  given  in  the  Records  of  ' '  The  Meeting  for 
Sufferings." 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      153 

freedom  from  supporting  any  system  of  worship  which 
their  consciences  did  not  approve.  The  privilege  to 
worship  in  their  own  way  and  in  their  own  gatherings 
was  won  at  terrific  cost,  as  we  have  seen,  but  it  was 
comparatively  quickly  won.  It  was  discovered  by  an 
overwhelming  demonstration  that  the  denial  of  the 
privilege  could  be  maintained  only  by  the  extermination 
of  the  sect,  and  thus  there  was  no  rational  alternative  but 
to  yield.  The  other  privilege,  the  privilege  of  exemption 
from  tithes  for  the  support  of  the  established  ministry, 
was  won  only  by  a  long,  hard  fight,  but  when  it  was  won 
it  was  won  for  everybody. 

From  the  first  Friends  refused  to  pay  the  Church 
"tithes,"  which  they  called  "priests'  rates,"  for  they 
insisted  that  "  spiritual  ministry  "  must  be  without  money 
and  without  price.  They  were  imprisoned  for  their 
refusal,  and  they  were  furthermore  subjected  to  a 
capricious  seizure  of  goods,  roughly  estimated  by  the 
authorities  to  equal  in  value  the  amount  of  the  tithes. 
Cows,  horses,  pigs,  farm  produce,  wearing  apparel,  house 
hold  silver,  wagons,  implements  of  all  sorts  were  carried 
away,  while  the  poor  family  looked  helplessly  on  and  saw 
themselves  stripped  to  pay  for  a  ministry  which  supported 
itself  by  such  methods ! l  The  Meetings,  with  their 
splendid  group  spirit,  made  these  losses  a  corporate 
matter  and  all  shared,  as  far  as  they  could,  the  sufferings 
of  each.  The  Meetings  rose  to  the  crisis  and  year  after 
year  raised  great  sums  to  cover  the  losses  of  Friends 
both  at  home  and  in  remote  sections.2  But  they  did 
not  stop  with  passive  resistance  to  the  tithe  system. 
They  laboured  for  three-quarters  of  a  century  by  every 

1  This  minute  from  Dartmouth  Monthly  Meeting  will  illustrate  the  sort  of 
distraints  which  were  endured  : 

' '  4/2/1725.  — The  accounts  of  some  sufferings  of  Peleg  Slocum,  and  John  Tucker 
having  their  creatures  taken  away  off  their  Islands  (called  Elizabeth  Islands)  by 
distraint  by  John  Mayhew,  constable  of  Chilmark,  was  presented  to  the  Meeting. 

"  Taken  from  Peleg  Slocum  eighty  sheep  for  the  Priests'  rate  and  towards  the 
building  of  a  Presbyterian  Meeting  house,  ye  said  sheep  were  sold  for  ^34. 

' '  And  taken  from  John  Tucker  on  ye'like  occasion  one  horse  sold  for  £10,  IDS. 
and  one  heifer  sold  for  £2,  ios.,  demand  was  for  £7,  155.  4d." 

2  I  give  three  Minutes  from  the  Yearly  Meeting  to  illustrate  this  corporate 
action : 

"  4/11/1730. — The  amount  of  sufferings  brought  up  from  the  Quarterly  Meet- 


154    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

method  known  to  their  intelligence,  or  "revealed  by 
the  mind  of  Truth "  to  get  the  tyranny  abolished  by 
statute.1 

In  the  year  1678,  four  prominent  Friends,  Edward 
Wanton,  Joseph  Coleman,  Nathaniel  Fitsrandal  and 
William  Allen,  presented  to  the  General  Court  of 
Plymouth,  "conscientiously  and  in  all  tenderness,"  their 
reasons  why  they  could  not  "give  maintenance  to  the 
established  preachers."  "  We  suppose,"  they  say,  "  it's 
well  enough  known  that  we  have  never  been  backward  to 
contribute  our  assistance  in  our  estates  and  persons, 
where  we  could  act  without  scruple  of  conscience,  nor  in 
the  particular  case  of  the  country  rate  .  .  .  until  this  late 
contrivance  of  mixing  your  preachers'  maintenance  there 
with,"  which,  in  short,  they  declare  they  cannot  under 
any  circumstances  pay.  They  thereupon  undertake  at 
some  length  to  prove  from  the  New  Testament  that 
"  settled  maintenance  upon  preachers  "  is  contrary  to  the 
gospel.  Whether  their  exegesis  carried  weight  with  the 
Court  or  not,  their  concluding  remark  must  have  occasioned 
some  serious  reflection  :  "  We  request,  for  conclusion,  you 
will  please  to  consider  whether  you  may  not  prejudice 
yourselves  in  your  public  interest  with  the  King  (you  your 
selves  having  your  liberty  but  upon  sufferance)  if  you 
should  compel  any  to  conform  in  any  respect  to  such  a 
church  government  or  ministry  as  is  repugnant  to  the 
Church  of  England.  We  leave  the  whole  to  your  serious 

ing  are  as  followeth  :  For  Priests  rates  taken  from  Friends  in  Salem  Quarterly 
Meeting  ,£118,  us." 

"  4/ 1  i/i  73 1 .  — Friends  Sufferings  from  Rochester,  Massachusetts,  for  priests  rates 
£23,  175.  Friends  suffering  from  Salem  for  Priests  rates  ,£10,  175.  6d. " 

"4/8/1732. — Friends  sufferings  from  Priests  rates  in  Kittery  in  the  County  of 
York  and  Province  of  Maine  £i$<  IDS." 

1  The  work  of  petitioning  the  governing  authorities  at  home  and  abroad  went  on 
year  after  year  with  admirable  persistence.  Here  is  an  interesting  minute  of  the 
year  1708  :  "It  being  proposed  under  the  consideration  of  this  Meeting  the 
detriament  yt  may  attend  Friends  by  an  act  past  in  the  Massachusetts  Provence 
in  the  year  1706  joining  the  Priests  rate  to  the  Province  tax  [making  it  extremely 
difficult  for  Friends  to  escape  paying  it]  this  Meeting  doth  desire,  or  order, 
Richard  Borden  and  Thomas  Cornell  Jr.  in  behalf  of  said  Meeting  to  inform  the 
Governor  thereof  by  way  of  writing,  requesting  his  relief  therein,  otherwise  to 
signify  to  him  that  they  shall  address  the  Queen  [  Queen  Anne]  in  that  matter ; 
and  said  Cornell  to  sign  the  same  in  behalf  of  the  Meeting,  being  clerk  thereof ; 
and  Joseph  Wanton,  and  Richard  Borden  are  appointed  to  do  said  writing  to  ye 
Governor  and  speal  [spell]  the  same. " 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      155 

consideration." l  The  writers  of  this  document  evidently 
remembered  the  "  King's  missive." 

A  half-century  later,  in  1724,  the  English  King, 
through  his  council,  did  finally  declare  himself  in  no 
uncertain  words  on  this  matter  of  "  maintenance  of 
ministers,"  and  this  second  missive,  this  time  from  George 
I.,  though  not  as  dramatic  as  the  famous  one  from 
Charles  II.,  hastened  the  end  of  persecution  for  refusal  to 
pay  church  rates.  Appeal  to  the  King  had  been  made 
in  1724  by  Thomas  Richardson  and  Richard  Partridge 
on  behalf  of  Joseph  Anthony,  John  Sisson,  John  Akin 
and  Philip  Taber,  Quaker  assessors  of  Dartmouth  and 
Tiverton,  who  had  been  imprisoned  in  New  Bristol  jail  for 
refusing  to  collect  taxes  to  support  the  ministry. 

Their  case  was  argued  before  the  Privy  Council  and 
the  following  significant  decision  was  rendered  at  a  Court 
held  at  St.  James',  the  2nd  day  of  June,  1724,  and 
attended  by  the  King's  Most  Excellent  Majesty,  His 
Royal  Highness  the  Prince  of  Wales,  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury,  and  thirteen  other  members  of  the  Court.  It 
was  as  follows :  "  His  Majesty  in  Council  is  graciously 
pleased  ...  to  remit  the  additional  taxes  of  ;£ioo  and 
£72,  us.  which  were  to  have  been  assessed  on  the  towns 
of  Dartmouth  and  Tiverton  [for  the  maintenance  of  Pres 
byterian  ministers  who  are  not  of  their  persuasion].2  And 
His  Majesty  is  hereby  further  pleased  to  order  that  the 
said  Joseph  Anthony,  John  Sisson,  John  Akin,  and  Philip 
Taber  be  immediately  released  from  their  imprisonment, 
on  account  thereof,  which  the  governor,  lieutenant- 
governor,  or  commander-in-chief  for  the  time  being  of  His 
Majesty's  said  province  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  and  all 
others  whom  it  may  concern  are  to  take  notice  of,  and 
yield  obedience  thereunto." 8 

These  persistent  efforts,  made  year  after  year  to  secure 
relief  from  these  "rates,"  finally  bore  fruit,  and  the 

1  The  Hinckley  Papers,  pp.  18-20. 

z  This  clause  is  in  the  report  of  the  Privy  Council  which  was  approved  by  the 
king. 

3  The  Petition  and  the  decision  of  the  Privy  Council,  with  the  King's  message 
are  given  in  full  in  Cough's  History  of  the  Quakers  (Dublin,  1790).  iv.  218-226. 


156    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

colonial  government  of  Massachusetts  passed  a  law  in 
1746  giving  Friends  temporary  exemption  from  all 
charges  for  the  maintenance  of  ministers.  The  Yearly 
Meeting  appointed  a  committee  in  1 747  to  petition  the 
General  Court  of  Massachusetts  to  make  this  law 
perpetual.  They  succeeded  for  the  moment  in  getting 
only  another  temporary  act  of  exemption,  which,  however, 
very  soon  became  a  permanent  law  ;  and  from  this  time 
on  the  subject  disappears  from  the  minutes,  and  the 
Quaker  enjoyed  his  own  meeting  in  peace  and  kept  his 
cows  and  his  silver  spoons  for  his  own  use ! 

The  next  great  contest  into  which  the  Friends  threw 
their  energies  was  a  more  unselfish  cause  and  one  which 
was  grounded  distinctly  in  humanitarian  principles — 
I  mean  the  conflict  against  human  slavery.  The 
Narragansett  Bay  country  was  the  region  where  negro 
slavery  most  "  flourished  "  in  New  England.  Ships  sailed 
from  Newport  to  the  coast  of  Guinea  and  brought  back 
live  freight  which  was  sold  among  the  prosperous  colonial 
farmers  along  the  fertile  shores  of  the  Bay.1  There  were, 
too,  slaves  in  many  other  parts  of  the  New  England 
colonies. 

There  was  little  or  no  moral  sentiment  in  the  colonies 
against  slavery  in  the  seventeenth  century,  and  Friends 
fell  in  with  the  custom,  as  others  did,  with  few  apparent 
scruples.  They  were,  however,  from  the  first  awake  to 
the  fact  that  black  people  were  human,  and  deserved 
proper  treatment  as  human  beings,  though  they  evidently 
did  not  see,  before  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
that  slavery  per  se  must  go.2 

1  See  Caroline  Hazard's  College  Tom  (Boston,  1893)  p.  25. 

2  These  minutes  from  Sandwich  Monthly  Meeting  are  interesting  as  illustrating 
the  way  the  meeting  dealt  with  inhumanity  to  slaves  : 

"  S/S0/1?11- — Whereas  a  woman  Friend  hath  given  over  to  hardness  of  heart 
to  such  a  degree  she  hath  been  not  only  consenting  but  encouraging  the  unmerciful 
whipping  or  beating  of  her  negro  man  servant,  he  being  stript  naked,  and  hanged 
up  by  the  hands,  in  his  master's  house,  and  then  beating  him,  or  whipping  him 
so  unmercifully  that  it  is  to  be  feared  that  it  was  in  some  measure  the  occasion  of 
his  death  that  followed  soon  after,  the  which  we  do  account  is  not  only  unchristian 
but  inhuman  for  which  cause  we  find  ourselves  concerned  to  testify  to  the  world 
that  we  utterly  disown  all  such  actions,  and  perticularly  the  Friend  above 
mentioned." 

"  10/17/1711. — A  paper  being  presented  to  this  Meeting  from  the  Friend  who 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      157 

The  enlightened  members,  even  in  the  first  quarter  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  "  felt  a  weighty  concern  "  to  have 
the  Society  "cleared"  of  what  seemed  to  them  an  evilr 
and  their  influence  was  great  enough  to  get  the  matter 
well  before  the  Yearly  Meeting  at  Newport,  and  to  get 
this  minute  adopted  in  1717: 

"A  weighty  concern  being  on  this  Meeting  concerning  the 
importing  and  keeping  slaves.  This  Meeting  therefore  refers  it 
to  the  consideration  of  Friends  everywhere  to  waite  for  ye  wisdom 
of  God  how  to  discharge  themselves  in  that  weighty  affair,  and 
desires  it  may  be  brought  up  from  our  Monthly  and  Quarterly 
Meetings  to  our  next  Yearly  Meeting,  and  also  yt  merchants  do 
write  their  correspondents  in  the  islands  and  elsewhere  to  dis 
courage  their  sending  any  more  [slaves]  in  order  to  be  sold  by 
Friends  here." 

Again  in  1727  the  Yearly  Meeting  rose  to  a  more 
direct  and  positive  position,  indicating  that  the  moral  tide 
had  risen  during  the  decade.  The  minute  of  this  date 
declares  : 

"It  is  the  sense  of  this  Meeting,  that  the  importation  of 
Negroes  from  their  native  country  and  relations  is  not  a  com 
mendable  nor  allowable  practice  and  that  practice  is  censured 
by  this  Meeting." 

Thomas  Hazard  of  South  Kingstown,  Rhode  Island. 
generally  called  "  College  Tom,"  seems  to  have  been  one 
of  the  first  Friends  to  awake  to  the  evil  of  slave-holding, 
though  he  was  brought  up  in  the  very  atmosphere  of  it. 
He  was  sent,  while  still  in  his  youth,  by  his  father  to 
Connecticut  to  buy  cattle  to  stock  the  farm  upon  which 
at  his  marriage  he  was  to  settle.  While  there  he  fell  in 
with  a  friend  of  his  father's,  a  deacon  of  the  Church, 
who  invited  him  to  his  home.  The  deacon  in  conversation 
made  the  chance  remark  that  "  Quakers  were  not  Christian 
people."  The  young  Quaker,  fresh  from  college,  was 
ready  for  a  hot  argument,  and  was  marshalling  in  his 
mind  the  arguments  of  attack  when  all  his  heat  was 

was  disowned  for  unmercifully  beating  her  Negro,  wherein  she  desires  to  come 
into  unity  with  Friends,  and  ye  sense  of  this  Meeting  is  that  she  should  wait  until 
Friends  have  a  sense  that  she  is  still  to  be  accepted,  and  Eleazer  Slocum  and 
William  Soule  are  appointed  to  give  her  ye  mind  of  the  Meeting." 


158    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

suddenly  dampened  by  the  deacon's  reason  for  his  bold 
statement — "  they  are  not  Christians  because  they  hold 
their  fellow-men  in  slavery ! "  The  Quaker  youth  had 
no  more  to  say  ;  but  the  stray  shot  took  deep  effect  and 
the  son  came  back  to  his  father  with  altered  views  on  the 
question. 

"  College  Tom's"  father  was  at  this  time — about  1730 
— one  of  the  largest  slave-owners  in  New  England,  and 
he  vigorously  objected  to  his  son's  new  ideas,  threatening 
to  disinherit  him  if  he  persisted  in  the  view ;  but  the 
conscientious  son  remained  unmoved,  and  cultivated  his 
farm  with  free  labour.1  He  seems  also  to  have  quietly 
propagated  his  ideas,  for  we  learn  that  his  intimate  friend, 
Jeremiah  Austin,  soon  after  this  freed  his  one  slave 
inherited  from  his  father. 

Meantime  the  spirit  of  opposition  to  slavery  was 
steadily  growing  throughout  the  Quaker  groups  scattered 
over  the  New  England  colonies,  and  Yearly  Meeting 
minutes  of  1743  and  1744  indicate  that  the  "inner  eye" 
was  getting  clearer  in  many  a  Quaker  breast. 

"4/9/1743. — It  being  represented  by  the  Quarterly  Meeting 
of  Rhode  Island  that  the  practice  of  keeping  slaves  is  a  matter 
of  uneasiness  to  many  concerned  Friends,  and  the  minutes 
formerly  made  by  this  Meeting  being  also  considered.  It  is 
agreed  by  this  meeting  that  we  request  by  our  Epistles  to  the 
Yearly  Meeting  of  Friends  in  Pennsylvania  an  account  of  what 
they  have  done  in  that  matter." 

"4/7/1744. — By  the  Epistle  we  have  received  from  Phila 
delphia  concerning  slaves,  this  Meeting  is  encouraged  to  revive, 
and  recommend  to  Friends  the  careful  observation  of  the  minute 
of  this  Meeting  made  in  1717  concerning  that  matter,  and  that 
they  also  refrain  from  buying  them  when  imported,  and  to  make 
return  by  the  epistles  from  the  several  Quarterly  Meetings  how 
the  same  is  observed." 

1  See  College  Tom,  chapter  iii.  A  law  was  enacted  in  the  Rhode  Island 
colony  in  1729  allowing  a  master  to  manumit  a  slave  provided  said  master  should 
give  a  security  of  j£ioo  that  the  manumitted  slave  should  not  become  a  public 
charge.  Bishop  Berkeley  during  his  stay  in  Rhode  Island  became  deeply  interested 
in  the  negro  slaves  and  urged  that  they  should  be  baptized,  using  these  enlightened 
words  :  ' '  Let  me  beseech  you  to  consider  them  not  merely  as  slaves,  but  as  men 
slaves  and  women  slaves,  who  have  the  same  frame  and  faculties  as  yourselves, 
and  have  souls  capable  of  being  made  happy,  and  reason  and  understanding  to 
receive  instruction. " — Updike's  History  of  Narragansttt  Church,  pp.  176,  177. 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      159 

In  1747  New  England  was  visited  for  the  first  time 
by  that  saintly  Quaker  from  Mount  Holly,  New  Jersey, 
John  Woolman,  whose  sensitive  soul  was  already  burning 
with  love  for  his  dark-skinned  friends  in  slavery.  He 
visited  "  among  Friends  in  the  colony  of  Rhode  Island  " 
and  probably  came  into  personal  relation  with  Thomas 
Hazard,  as  Updike  calls  the  latter  John  Woolman's 
friend.  One  of  the  earliest  documents  against  slavery  in 
New  England,  and  certainly  one  of  the  quaintest  ever 
written,  is  a  letter  of  Richard  Smith  of  Groton,  Connecticut, 
to  South  Kingstown  Monthly  Meeting  of  which  he  was  a 
member.  He  declares  that  "  the  Lord  by  his  free  Goodness 
hath  given  me  a  clear  sight  of  the  cruelty  of  making  a  slave 
of  one  that  was  by  nature  as  free  as  my  own  children"  and 
to  turn  his  "  clear  sight "  into  practice  he  concluded  : 

"I  hereby  declare  that  now  that  my  Negro  garl  Jane  hath 
arived  to  eighteen  years  of  age  she  shall  go  out  free  from 
bondage  as  free  as  if  Shee  had  been  free  born,  and  that  my 
Heirs,  Executors  or  Administraters  shall  have  no  power  over 
her  or  her  postirity  no  more  than  if  she  had  been  free  born." 1 

To  his  straightforward,  downright  Letter  Richard 
Smith  added  a  curious  postscript  which  contains  another 
item  of  his  experience  : 

"  Now  my  Friends  to  tell  you  plainly,  some  years  befor  this 
my  intent  was  to  have  bought  Some  Negro  Slaves  for  to  have 
Done  my  work  to  have  Saved  my  hiring  of  help.  But  when  I 
was  about  buying  them  I  was  forbiden  by  the  same  Power  that 
now  Causes  me  to  set  this  Garl  at  Liberty,  for  the  matter  was 
Set  befor  me  in  a  Clear  manner  more  Clear  than  what  mortal 
man  Could  have  Done  and  theirfore  I  belive  it  is  not  write  for 
me  to  Shrink  or  hide  in  a  thing  of  So  Create  a  Consarnment  as 
to  Give  my  Consent  to  do  to  others  Contrary  to  what  we  our 
Selves  would  be  willing  to  be  don  unto."  2 

1  Records  of  Greenwich  Monthly  Meeting. 

2  The  Monthly  Meeting  entered  this  minute  :   ' '  This  meeting  received  a  paper 
of  Richard  Smith  as  his  testimony  against  keeping  slaves  and  his  intention  to  free 
his  negro  girl,  which  paper  he  hath  a  mind  to  lay  before  the  Quarterly  Meeting, 
all  which  is  referred  for  further  consideration."      The  matter  did  not  receive 
much  attention  at  the  time,  and  meeting  after  meeting  passed  without  definite 
action,  but  Richard  Smith's  "testimony"  was  good  leaven,  and  soon  the  whole 
lump  was  permeated  with  it. 


160    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Three  years  after  this  testimony — in  1760 — came  the 
epoch-making  second  visit  of  John  Woolman,  now  fully 
alive  to  his  Divine  mission  in  behalf  of  the  slave.  He 
writes  : 

"We  had  five  meetings  in  Narragansett  [the  section  covered 
by  Greenwich  Monthly  Meeting]  and  went  thence  to  Newport 
on  Rhode  Island.  ...  In  several  families  in  the  country  where 
we  lodged,  I  felt  an  engagement  on  my  mind  to  have  a  conference 
with  them  in  private  concerning  their  slaves ;  and  through  Divine 
aid  I  was  favored  to  give  up  thereto.  ...  I  do  not  repine 
at  having  so  unpleasant  a  task  assigned  me,  but  look  with 
awfulness  to  Him  who  appoints  to  His  servants  their  respective 
employments."1 

The  crisis  of  his  visit  came  at  the  time  of  his  return 
to  Newport  for  Yearly  Meeting,  after  having  completed 
extensive  travels  over  New  England,  reaching  "eighty 
miles  beyond  Boston  eastward."  His  own  quaint  way  of 
telling  the  story  is  most  impressive : 

"Understanding  that  a  large  number  of  slaves  had  been 
imported  from  Africa  into  that  town,  and  were  then  on  sale  by 
a  member  of  our  Society  my  appetite  failed,  and  I  grew  out 
wardly  weak,  and  had  a  feeling  of  the  condition  of  Habakkuk, 
as  thus  expressed,  '  When  I  heard,  my  belly  trembled,  my  lips 
quivered,  1  trembled  in  myself,  that  I  might  rest  in  the  day  of 
trouble.'  I  had  many  cogitations,  and  was  sorely  distressed.  I 
was  desirous  that  Friends  might  petition  the  Legislature  to  use 
their  endeavours  to  discourage  the  future  importation  of  slaves, 
for  I  saw  that  this  trade  was  a  great  evil,  and  tended  to  multiply 
troubles,  and  to  bring  distresses  on  the  people  for  whose  welfare 
my  heart  was  deeply  concerned.  But  I  perceived  several 
difficulties  in  regard  to  petitioning,  and  such  was  the  exercise  of 
my  mind  that  I  thought  of  endeavouring  to  get  an  opportunity 
to  speak  a  few  words  in  the  House  of  Assembly,  then  sitting  in 
town. 

"  This  exercise  came  upon  me  in  the  afternoon  on  the  second 
day  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  and  on  going  to  bed  I  got  no  sleep 
till  my  mind  was  wholly  resigned  thereto.  In  the  morning  I 
inquired  of  a  Friend  how  long  the  Assembly  was  likely  to  continue 
sitting,  who  told  me  it  was  to  be  prorogued  that  day  or  the  next. 
As  I  was  desirous  to  attend  the  business  of  the  meeting,  and 
perceived  the  Assembly  was  likely  to  separate  before  the  business 

1  Journal,  p.  161. 


CH.  viz    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      161 

was  over,  after  considerable  exercise,  humbly  seeking  to  the 
Lord  for  instruction,  my  mind  settled  to  attend  on  the  business 
of  the  meeting ;  on  the  last  day  of  which  I  had  prepared  a  short 
essay  of  a  petition  to  be  presented  to  the  Legislature,  if  way 
opened.  And  being  informed  that  there  were  some  appointed 
by  that  Yearly  Meeting  to  speak  with  those  in  authority  on  cases 
relating  to  the  Society,  I  opened  my  mind  to  several  of  them, 
and  showed  them  the  essay  I  had  made,  and  afterwards  I  opened 
the  case  in  the  meeting  for  business,  in  substance  as  follows : 

" '  I  have  been  under  a  concern  for  some  time  on  account  of 
the  great  number  of  slaves  which  are  imported  into  this  colony. 
I  am  aware  that  it  is  a  tender  point  to  speak  to,  but  apprehend 
I  am  not  clear  in  the  sight  of  Heaven  without  doing  so.  I  have 
prepared  an  essay  of  a  petition  to  be  presented  to  the  Legislature, 
if  way  open ;  and  what  I  have  to  propose  to  this  meeting  is  that 
some  Friends  may  be  named  to  withdraw  and  look  over  it,  and 
report  whether  they  believe  it  suitable  to  be  read  in  the  meeting. 
If  they  should  think  well  of  reading  it,  it  will  remain  for  the 
meeting  to  consider  whether  to  take  any  further  notice  of  it,  as  a 
meeting,  or  not.'  After  a  short  conference  some  Friends  went 
out,  and,  looking  over  it,  expressed  their  willingness  to  have  it 
read,  which  being  done,  many  expressed  their  unity  with  the 
proposal,  and  some  signified  that  to  have  the  subjects  of  the 
petition  enlarged  upon,  and  signed  out  of  meeting  by  such  as 
were  free,  would  be  more  suitable  than  to  do  it  there.  Though 
I  expected  at  first  that  if  it  was  done  it  would  be  in  that  way, 
yet  such  was  the  exercise  of  my  mind  that  to  move  it  in  the 
hearing  of  Friends  when  assembled  appeared  to  me  as  a  duty,  for 
my  heart  yearned  towards  the  inhabitants  of  these  parts,  believing 
that  by  this  trade  there  had  been  an  increase  of  inquietude 
amongst  them,  and  way  had  been  made  for  the  spreading  of  a 
spirit  opposite  to  that  meekness  and  humility  which  is  a  sure 
resting-place  for  the  soul ;  and  that  the  continuance  of  this  trade 
would  not  only  render  their  healing  more  difficult,  but  would 
increase  their  malady.  Having  proceeded  thus  far,  I  felt  easy 
to  leave  the  essay  amongst  Friends,  for  them  to  proceed  in  it 
as  they  believed  best 

"The  Yearly  Meeting  being  over,  there  yet  remained  on  my 
mind  a  secret  though  heavy  exercise,  in  regard  to  some  leading 
active  members  about  Newport,  who  were  in  the  practice  of 
keeping  slaves.  This  I  mentioned  to  two  ancient  Friends  who 
came  out  of  the  country,  and  proposed  to  them,  if  way  opened, 
to  have  some  conversation  with  those  members.  One  of  them 
and  I,  having  consulted  one  of  the  most  noted  elders  who  had 
slaves,  he,  in  a  respectful  manner,  encouraged  me  to  proceed  to 

M 


162    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES    BK.  i 

clear  myself  of  what  lay  upon  me.  Near  the  beginning  of  the 
Yearly  Meeting,  I  had  had  a  private  conference  with  this  said 
elder  and  his  wife,  concerning  their  slaves,  so  that  the  way 
seemed  clear  to  me  to  advise  with  him  about  the  manner  of 
proceeding.  I  told  him  I  was  free  to  have  a  conference  with 
them  altogether  in  a  private  house ;  or  if  he  thought  they  would 
take  it  unkind  to  be  asked  to  come  together,  and  to  be  spoken 
with  in  the  hearing  of  one  another,  I  was  free  to  spend  some 
time  amongst  them,  and  to  visit  them  all  in  their  own  houses. 
He  expressed  his  liking  to  the  first  proposal,  not  doubting  their 
willingness  to  come  together ;  and,  as  I  proposed  a  visit  to  only 
ministers,  elders,  and  overseers,  he  named  some  others  whom  he 
desired  might  also  be  present.  A  careful  messenger  being 
wanted  to  acquaint  them  in  a  proper  manner,  he  offered  to  go 
to  all  their  houses,  to  open  the  matter  to  them — and  did  so. 
About  the  eighth  hour  the  next  morning  we  met  in  the  meeting 
house  chamber,  the  last  mentioned  country  Friend,  my  companion, 
and  John  Storer  being  with  us.  After  a  short  time  of  retirement, 
I  acquainted  them  with  the  steps  I  had  taken  in  procuring  that 
meeting,  and  opened  the  concern  I  was  under,  and  we  then 
proceeded  to  a  free  conference  upon  the  subject  My  exercise 
was  heavy,  and  I  was  deeply  bowed  in  spirit  before  the  Lord, 
who  was  pleased  to  favour  with  the  seasoning  virtue  of  truth, 
which  wrought  a  tenderness  amongst  us  ;  and  the  subject  was 
mutually  handled  in  a  calm  and  peaceable  spirit.  At  length, 
feeling  my  mind  released  from  the  burden  which  I  had  been 
under,  I  took  my  leave  of  them  in  a  good  degree  of  satisfaction ; 
and  by  the  tenderness  they  manifested  in  regard  to  the  practice, 
and  the  concern  several  of  them  expressed  in  relation  to  the 
manner  of  disposing  of  their  negroes  after  their  decease,  I 
believed  that  a  good  exercise  was  spreading  amongst  them ;  and 
I  am  humbly  thankful  to  God,  who  supported  my  mind  and 
preserved  me  in  a  good  degree  of  resignation  through  these 
trials." l 

This  tender  soul,  by  his  gentle  spirit  and  his  words 
which  seemed  given  him  from  above,  moved  many 
Friends  to  a  higher  moral  level.  The  advance  is  very 
apparent  in  the  minute  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  adopted 
this  year  : 

"  We  fervently  warn  all  in  profession  with  us,  that  they  be 
careful  to  avoid  being  in  any  way  concerned  in  reaping  the 
unrighteous  profits  of  that  iniquitous  practice  in  dealing  in 

1  Journal,  pp.  163-165  and  166-168. 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      163 

negroes.  We  can  do  no  less  than,  with  the  greatest  earnestness, 
impress  it  upon  Friends  everywhere,  that  they  endeavour  to  keep 
their  hands  clear  of  this  unrighteous  gain  of  oppression." 

A  clause  was  added  to  the  Queries  at  this  same  Yearly 
Meeting,  asking  if  Friends  who  hold  slaves  "  treat  them 
with  tenderness,  impress  God's  fear  in  their  minds,  promote 
their  attending  places  of  religious  worship,  and  give  those 
that  are  young,  at  least,  so  much  learning  that  they  may 
be  capable  of  reading,"  it  being  taken  for  granted  that  no 
Friend  was  to  buy  any  new  slaves.  From  this  date 
onward  the  light  spread  rapidly,  and  the  Society  went  to 
work  with  zeal,  doubtless  sometimes  exhibited  in  harsh 
and  narrow  ways,  to  clear  its  skirts  not  only  of  traffic  in 
slaves,  but  of  ownership  of  them  as  well. 

Shortly  after  John  Woolman's  visit,  Greenwich  Monthly 
Meeting  brought  its  member,  Samuel  Rodman,  "  under 
dealing  "  "  on  account  of  his  buying  a  negro  slave,"  and 
passed  judgment  against  his  act.  The  advice  of  the 
Quarterly  and  Yearly  Meetings  was  asked  in  the  matter, 
and  both  these  meetings  confirmed  the  Monthly  Meeting 
in  its  "  Sence  and  Judgment,"  which  was  "  that  there 
ought  to  go  out  a  publick  Testimony  and  Denial  of 
Samuel  Rodman  "  ;  he  was  accordingly  disowned.1 

In  1769  Greenwich  Monthly  Meeting  sent  a  request 
to  the  Yearly  Meeting,  through  the  Quarterly  Meeting, 
that  the  "  Query  "  of  1760  should  be  so  changed  as  "  not 
to  imply  that  the  holding  of  slaves  was  allowable."  As 
is  the  custom  with  Friends,  such  a  weighty  proposal, 
affecting  the  affairs  of  many  members,  would  receive  most 
careful  consideration,  and  a  conclusion  would  be  arrived 
at  only  as  "  the  way  of  Truth  "  opened.  The  first  step 
was  to  appoint  at  the  Yearly  Meeting  in  1769  a  com 
mittee  of  eleven,  made  up  of  the  leading  men  of  the 
Society,  to  collect  information,  and  to  visit  all  slave-holding 

1  I  find  this  minute  on  the  Records  of  Newport  Monthly  Meeting  for 
7/29/1761  :  "A  Friend  appeared  in  this  meeting  and  condemned  his  conduct  in 
importing  of  Negroes,  and  selling  some,  and  hopes  he  shall  be  more  careful  for 
the  future,  and  desires  Friends  to  put  it  by,  which  is  taken  for  satisfaction."  The 
famous  case  of  continued  dealing  with  Joshua  Rathbun,  beginning  in  1765  and 
covering  eight  years,  is  given  at  length  in  Caroline  Hazard's  Narragansett  Friends' 
Meetings,  pp.  144-152. 


164    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Friends  in  the  territory  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  to  "  dissuade 
them  from  the  practice  of  keeping  slaves."  The  report  of 
this  committee,  given  in  1771,  is  a  valuable  document, 
and  shows  pretty  clearly  the  prevailing  state  of  mind.  It 
is  as  follows  : 

*r 

"  We  have  pretty  generally  visited  the  members  belonging  to 
the  Yearly  Meeting  who  are  possessed  of  negroes  as  slaves, 
and  have  laboured  with  them  respecting  setting  such  at  liberty 
that  are  suitable  for  freedom.  Our  visits  mostly  seemed  to  be 
kindly  accepted,  some  Friends  manifested  a  disposition  to  set 
such  at  liberty  as  were  suitable ;  some  others  not  having  so  clear 
a  sight  of  such  an  unreasonable  servitude  as  could  be  desired, 
were  unwilling  to  comply  with  the  advice ;  a  few  others,  whom 
we  have  with  sorrow  to  remark  were  mostly  of  the  elder  sort, 
manifested  a  disposition  to  keep  them  still  in  a  continued  state 
of  bondage." 

Two  years  later,  in  1773,  the  Meeting  faced  the 
question  of  the  "  Query  "  in  this  plain  and  straightforward 
fashion  : 

"  In  regard  to  the  Query  from  Rhode  Island  Quarterly  Meeting 
proposing  the  freeing  of  all  slaves,  it  is  our  sense  and  judgment 
that  Truth  not  only  requires  the  young  of  capacity  and  ability,  but 
likewise  the  aged  and  impotent,  and  all  in  a  state  of  infancy  and 
nonage,  among  Friends  to  be  discharged  and  set  free  from  a  state  of 
slavery  that  we  do  no  more  claim  property  in  the  human  race  as  we 
do  in  the  brutes  that  perish" 

Under  this  decision  of  the  supreme  legislative  body 
of  New  England  Friends,  the  subordinate  meetings  now 
went  to  work  everywhere  to  carry  out  the  spirit  and 
principle  of  1773,  and  the  records  for  the  next  ten  years 
contain  numerous  minutes  of  "  dealing "  with  Quaker 
slave-owners,  showing  in  every  case  that  the  only  way 
for  a  Friend  owning  a  slave  to  avoid  disownment  was  to 
"  give  the  negro  a  manumission  to  Friends'  satisfaction." 
The  most  celebrated  case  of  "  dealing  "  in  New  England 
was  that  of  Stephen  Hopkins,  a  member  of  Smithfield 
Monthly  Meeting.  He  had  been  governor  of  the  colony 
of  Rhode  Island  for  nine  annual  terms.  He  was  easily 
the  foremost  citizen  of  his  colony,  but  he  owned  one  slave 


CH.  vii     NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      165 

woman  and  would  not  set  her  free.      This  is  what   the 
meeting  did  with  the  case  : 

"The  matter  concerning  Stephen  Hopkins  holding  a  negro 
woman  as  a  slave  was  considered,  and  as  he  still  refuses  to  set 
her  at  liberty,  though  often  requested,  this  meeting  puts  him  from 
under  their  care,  and  appoints  Moses  Farnum  and  George 
Comstock  to  draw  up  a  paper  of  denial  against  him,  and  bring 
to  next  Monthly  Meeting."  1 

As  soon  as  the  machinery  was  well  in  motion  for  the 
removal  of  every  trace  of  human  slavery  from  the  Quaker 
group,  positive  efforts  were  at  once  inaugurated  to  bring 
influence  to  bear  in  shaping  legislation  in  the  direction  of 
abolition.  In  1774  this  minute  was  adopted  at  the 
Yearly  Meeting : 

"  This  Meeting,  manifesting  a  concern  that  the  liberty  of  the 
Africans  might  be  fully  restored,  we  appoint  our  Friends  Thomas 
Hazard,  Ezekiel  Comstock,  Thomas  Lapham,  Jr.,  Stephen 
Hoxie,  Joseph  Congdon,  Isaac  Lawton,  and  Moses  Farnum, 
a  committee  to  use  their  influence  at  the  Generall  Assembly  of 
the  Colony  of  Rhode  Island,  or  with  the  members  thereof,  that 
such  laws  may  be  made  as  will  tend  to  the  abolition  of  slavery, 
and  to  get  such  laws  repealed  as  in  any  way  encourages  it."  2 

And  in  1787  a  powerful  memorial  was  sent  from  the 
Yearly  Meeting  to  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts, 
urging  that  as  that  commonwealth  had  been  "  the  first  on 
this  continent  to  constitutionally  abolish  slavery "  in  its 
domain,  so  it  should  now  formulate  legislation  to  prevent 
its  citizens  from  engaging  in  "  the  unrighteous  traffic  "  in 
slaves,  "  manifesting  thereby,"  they  say,  "  your  endeavours 
that  the  great  revolution  of  this  country,  founded  on  a 
declaration  against  invasion  of  civil  liberty,  may  not  be 
tarnished  by  suffering  your  subjects  to  continue  a  traffic 
which  perpetuates  slavery."  A  boy  born  in  1807,  the 
descendant  of  ancestors  who  had  taken  part  in  this  slow 

1  "Drawing  up  a  paper  of  denial"  is  a  euphemism  for   "disowning,"  i.e. 
expulsion   from    membership.     As  Stephen    Hopkins    went   out   of  the  Quaker 
Society  his  friend  Moses  Brown  of  Providence  came  in,  and  as  a  preparation  to  this 
step  freed  all  his  slaves.     See  Augustine  Jones'  Moses  Brown  :  A  Sketch. 

2  Rhode  Island  Legislature  passed  an  Act  that  very  year,  1774,  by  which  the 
enslaving  of  negroes  was  for  ever  prohibited.     Stephen  Hopkins  was  the  author 
of  this  famous  Bill. 


166    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Quaker  uprising  against  the  wicked  custom  of  enslaving 
men,  was  above  all  others  to  sound  the  trumpet  against  it 
in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  was  to  stand  in  the  front  of 
the  moral  battle  for  freedom — John  Green  leaf  Whittier. 

Friends  have  always  emphasized  the  importance  of 
education,  and  wherever  Quakerism  flourished  the  school- 
house  followed  close  after  the  "  meeting-house,"  while  in 
some  notable  instances  there  has  been  one  building  for 
both.  The  first  minute  on  education  which  I  have  found 
in  New  England  is  on  the  Records  of  Newport  Monthly 
Meeting  under  date  of  twelfth  month  24th,  1684: 

"  Upon  request  and  desire  of  Christian  Loddwick  to  have  the 
use  of  the  Meeting  House  in  Newport  for  keeping  of  a  school, 
Friends,  upon  consideration  and  desire  to  do  him  good,  do 
grant  it  and  are  also  willing  to  give  him  what  encouragement 
they  can." l 

The  course  taken  by  the  Newport  Friends  was  a  very 
usual  one  in  any  Quaker  community.  For  the  first 
hundred  years  of  their  history  the  New  England  Friends 
had  only  these  local  schools  for  the  "  guarded  education  " 
of  their  children,  but  in  the  'seventies  of  the  eighteenth 
century  there  appears  to  have  been  a  powerful  awakening 
to  the  need  of  broader  education  and  for  a  more  adequate 
educational  system.  A  large  committee  of  broad-minded 
men  was  appointed  at  the  Yearly  Meeting  of  1779,  and 
the  Quarterly  Meetings  were  asked  to  appoint  co-operat 
ing  committees  of  "  solid  Friends,"  who  after  the  usual 
careful  and  weighty  deliberation,  carried  on  for  three  years, 
recommended  the  establishment  of  a  central  school  for 
the  entire  Yearly  Meeting,  one  of  its  functions  being  the 

1  There  are  two  further  minutes  which  throw  interesting  light  on  the  history  of 
this  school  : — 

12/26/1711. — "  The  Friends  appointed  to  lay  out  as  much  land  as  might  be 
thought  suitable  for  to  set  a  school-house  on,  made  report  that  they  have  laid 
out  a  certain  piece  of  land  adjoining  to  Sam.  Easton's  land  containing  sixty  feet 
fronting  upon  the  lane  and  eighty  feet  deep. " 

6/26/1718. — "The  proprietors  of  the  school-house  in  Newport  have  freely 
surrendered  and  given  up  their  rights  in  said  School-house  to  the  Monthly 
Meeting  to  be  continued  by  said  Meeting  for  a  school-house,  and  that  said 
Meeting  pay  to  the  several  proprietors  what  they  have  advanced  more  than  their 
subscriptions  within  one  year's  time  with  reasonable  interest.  The  money 
advanced  by  the  several  proprietors  which  is  to  be  paid  by  this  meeting  is 
£56:4:8." 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      167 

preparation  of  teachers  for  the  local  communities.  It  was 
a  difficult  matter  to  fix  upon  a  satisfactory  location,  but 
finally  Portsmouth,  R.I.,  was  selected  as  the  favoured  place. 
The  school  was  accordingly  opened  there  in  1784,  being 
the  first  Yearly  Meeting  School  established  in  America. 
Isaac  Lawton  was  selected  to  be  the  "  master  "  of  it,  and 
he  accepted  the  position  in  the  "  trust  that  he  will  receive 
seventy-five  pounds  per  year  to  keep  the  school."  l  The 
price  of  board  was  arranged  to  be  four  shillings  per  week 
for  children  under  fourteen,  and  "  four  and  six  for  those 
above."  The  hoped-for  funds  for  this  important  venture 
did  not  materialize,  and  in  1788  the  school  came  to  a 
speedy  close  of  its  career.2 

Friends  came  into  collision  at  so  many  points  with  the 
Churches  of  what  they  call  the  "  Presbyterian  system " 
that  there  was  little  opportunity  for  them  in  colonial  days 
to  co-operate  with  their  Christian  neighbours  in  New 
England  in  moral  and  philanthropic  undertakings.  The 
result  was  that  they  felt  themselves  forced  to  discover 
their  own  peculiar  moral  activities  and  their  own  humani 
tarian  efforts.  Quite  naturally,  at  first  they  were  specially 
absorbed  in  the  work  of  winning  their  own  emancipation 
from  what  appeared  to  them  the  tyranny  of  those  who 
made  laws  for  them,  but  as  fast  as  they  won  their  freedom 
they  took  up  the  fight  on  behalf  of  other  peoples  who  were 
oppressed  and  hampered,  and  they  proved  to  be  good 
leaders  of  what  seemed  at  the  time  "  lost  causes "  and 
"  forlorn  hopes."  Their  primary  concern,  as  I  have 
already  implied,  was  the  formation  of  a  "  peculiar  people." 
This  aim,  to  my  mind,  always  hampered  them,  limited 
their  scope,  and  narrowed  their  field  of  public  usefulness, 
but  as  I  am  endeavouring  to  give  a  faithful  historical  picture, 
I  must  dwell  for  a  little,  in  concluding  this  chapter,  upon 
their  zealous  labours  to  construct  their  own  "  beloved  Zion." 

They  were  the  bearers  of  a  religious  message  which  in 

1  This  extravagant  fee  was  soon  dropped  to  fifty  pounds  ! 

2  Through  the  persistent  efforts  of  Moses  Brown  of  Providence,  one  of  the 
main  creators  of  this  Portsmouth  school,  and  by  the  assistance  of  his  generous 
gift,  the  school  was  revived  in  1819,  located  at  Providence,  and  has  had  a  famous 
history  and  has  rendered  great  service  to  the  cause  of  education. 


1 68    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

essence  and  idea  contained  much  that  was  permanent  and 
universal.  They  showed  a  real  genius  for  feeling  out  the 
great  elemental  truths  of  Christianity  and  for  avoiding  the 
scholastic  formulations  which  were  doomed,  sooner  or 
later,  to  have  "  mene "  written  on  them.  While  others 
were  still  speculating  over  the  "  decrees  "  and  "  schemes  " 
of  a  divine  Sovereign,  they  were  living  in  a  joyous 
consciousness  of  a  divine  Father  who  was,  and  is,  and 
will  be  the  inward  Spirit  and  Life  and  Light  of  all  who 
strive  and  aspire.  They  no  doubt  often  talked  about 
their  conception  of  God  in  narrow  and  somewhat  for 
bidding  terminology,  but  wherever  one  comes  upon  their 
great  central  idea,  adequately  expressed,  in  epistle,  sermon, 
or  autobiographical  journal,  he  finds  a  glimpse,  at  least, 
of  an  ever  new  yet  ever  old  truth,  that  God  is  immanent, 
self-revealing,  and  eternally  redeeming  the  race,  and 
working  His  Life  into  the  lives  of  men.1  But  the 
moment  one  leaves  this  central  doctrine  and  turns  to  the 
efforts  which  were  made  to  maintain  peculiarities,  the 
"  genius "  appears  lacking,  and  the  movement  seems  to 
be  caught  in  a  back-wash.  There  was,  no  doubt,  a  real 
call  in  the  middle  decades  of  the  seventeenth  century  for 
a  vigorous  and  uncompromising  campaign  against  sham 
and  hollowness,  and  for  a  protest  against  fashions  and 
forms  of  etiquette  which  were  a  burden  to  the  life,  and 
which  buried  the  person  under  a  rubbish  of  meaningless 
mannerisms.  The  Quaker  uttered  that  protest  with  a 
commendable  fearlessness,  and  he  had  a  straightforward 
way  of  calling  things  by  their  plain  names  and  of  bringing 
the  naked  truth  to  the  front.  That  was  good  service  ; 
and  so,  too,  was  his  steady  insistence  on  human  equality 
and  the  potential  nobility  of  every  man. 

1  Here  are  two  sample  passages  from  epistles  which  were  read  in  all  their 
meetings  :  "Be  careful  and  labor  in  the  peaceable  gospel,  to  settle,  stay,  and 
establish  peoples'  minds  in  the  holy  principle  of  Life  and  Light  .  .  .  and  where 
there  is  the  least  budding  or  breaking  forth  of  Life  let  it  be  nourished  and 
encouraged." — London  Epistle  of  1672.  "And  now,  dear  friends,  who  profess 
and  possess  that  which  is  above  all  religions,  ways,  and  worships  in  the  world, 
our  desire  is  that  you  may  outstrip  and  exceed  the  world  in  virtue,  in  purity,  in 
chastity,  in  godliness,  and  in  holiness  ;  and  in  modesty,  civility,  and  in  righteous 
ness  and  love,  so  that  your  sober  life  may  appear  to  all  and  may  answer  that  of 
God  in  all. " — Epistle  of  George  Fox  to  New  England  Friends  in  1684. 


CH.  vii    NEW  TYPE  OF  SOCIAL  RELIGION      169 

But  it  is  an  unmistakable  fact  that  the  principle  soon 
fell  to  a  subconscious  level,  and  the  "  testimonies,"  which 
probably  had  their  origin  in  vitality,  as  a  graphic  method 
of  uttering  human  principle,  became  an  end  in  themselves 
and  were  finally  cherished  as  the  badges  of  a  peculiar 
people.  The  use  of  "  thee  "  and  "  thou  "  was  initiated 
from  a  sincere  desire  to  emphasize  the  equality  of  men, 
for  the  plural  "  you  "  was  used  only  in  addressing  persons 
of  dignity  and  standing ;  but  the  use  of  "  you "  rapidly 
became  universal  custom,  and  whatever  principle  may  have 
attached  to  "thou"  disappeared,  and  the  New  England 
Quaker  of  the  eighteenth  century  could  give  no  reason  for 
this  peculiar  language.  The  hat  "  testimony  "  came  to  be 
even  more  devoid  of  significance  and  rationality.  There 
may  have  been  some  point  once  in  keeping  covered 
because  of  a  desire  not  "  to  give  to  men  an  honour  which 
belonged  to  God,"  but  the  custom  of  wearing  the  hat 
before  magistrates  and  in  religious  assemblies  soon  became 
only  a  "  custom."  It  ceased  to  have  an  inner  meaning, 
and  it  proclaimed  no  important  truth,  as  one  realises  at 
once  when  he  reads  the  explanations  which  were  given 
for  it.  When  we  remember  that  almost  nothing  cost 
so  much  in  suffering  as  did  this  refusal  to  "  uncover " 
we  can  only  wish  the  life  had  been  staked  on  a  greater 
issue.1 

The  refusal  to  take  an  oath  was  in  a  higher  region  of 
principle — the  determination  that  there  should  be  but  one 
standard  of  truth-telling.  But  the  significance  of  even  this 
testimony  was  much  blurred  by  the  failure  to  exhibit  its 
living  import  and  by  the  tendency  to  treat  it  as  a  "  com 
mand."  It  was,  again,  a  great  drop  when  the  Quaker  passed 
from  his  primitive  call  to  simplicity  of  life  and  freedom 
from  the  yoke  of  fashion,  and  took  the  dangerously  easy 
method  of  adopting  a  garb,  which  soon  came  to  be 

1  It  is  evident  that  the  Quaker  converts  in  New  England  at  once  adopted  this 
badge.  Humphrey  Norton  gives  us  this  interesting  passage  about  the  case  of 
William  Shattuck  of  Boston,  who  is  here  speaking  for  himself:  "After  I  was 
convinced  by  the  Light  of  the  Lord  in  me  I  was  brought  to  their  court,  and 
entering  with  my  hat  on,  John  Endicott  looking  on  me  with  great  disdain  said, 
Art  thou  come  to  this?" — Ensign,  p.  65. 


1 70    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

another  peculiar  badge  and  a  mark  of  "  spirituality." 1 
These  things  have,  no  doubt,  been  often  defended,  and 
they  were  pursued  in  unmistakable  sincerity ;  but  they 
plainly  drew  attention  away  from  the  real  spiritual 
message,  they  quickly  became  ends-in-themselves,  and  as 
they  rose  in  importance,  the  propagation  of  spiritual 
religion  as  a  way  of  living  for  all  men  as  men  declined. 
One  reads  to-day  with  melancholy  and  a  sense  of  sadness, 
of  the  vast  labour  and  pains  which  these  good  people 
bestowed  on  these  "  fences,"  and  one  wishes  that  the  same 
zeal  had  been  bestowed  in  expanding  their  central  living 
truth  of  an  indwelling  and  Emmanuel  God  who  is  un- 
weariedly  at  work  making  a  divine  kingdom  out  of  men 
like  us  !  But  while  we  speak  with  regret  of  the  excessive 
activity  directed  to  the  cultivation  of  customs,  in  their 
very  nature  bound  to  arrest  spiritual  development,  we  can 
review  with  enthusiasm  the  persistent  efforts  which  these 
same  people  made  to  emancipate  the  minds  and  bodies  of 
their  fellow-men  in  New  England  and  elsewhere,  and  one 
is  profoundly  impressed  with  the  conviction,  as  he  goes 
through  their  journals  and  epistles,  that  they  had  dis 
covered  the  supreme  secret — how  to  find  God  and  enjoy 
Him  in  the  pathway  of  this  our  earthly  life. 

1  The  importance  of  these  badges  appears  in  very  early  documents.  An 
Epistle  of  1697  says  :  "  Friends  everywhere,  keep  to  plainness  in  speech,  habit, 
and  dealing,  and  keep  to  our  testimony  in  calling  the  months  and  days  by 
Scripture  names  and  not  by  heathen." 


CHAPTER    VIII 

NEW    ENGLAND    QUAKERS    IN    POLITICS 

THE  first  opportunity  for  a  Quaker  experiment  in  govern 
ment  came  to  the  Friends  in  Rhode  Island,  where  for 
more  than  a  hundred  years,  with  temporary  fluctuations 
of  their  influence,  they  had  an  important  share  in  the 
direction  of  the  affairs  of  the  colony. 

The  Colony  of  Rhode  Island  was  founded,  as  we  have 
seen,  by  a  group  of  men  who  came  into  sharp  collision 
with  the  religious  system  of  the  Puritan  Colony  of 
Massachusetts.  Some  of  them  were  compulsory  exiles, 
and  some  of  them  were  voluntary  exiles,  from  the  mother 
Colony  of  Massachusetts,  because  they  were  highly 
resolved  to  be  free  themselves  and  to  set  other  men's 
souls  free  from  all  ecclesiastical  tyranny.1  The  leading 
persons  in  the  group — Coddington,  Coggeshall,  Easton, 
the  Clarkes,  Hutchinsons,  Dyers,  and  Bulls — had  already 
arrived  at  a  type  of  religion  in  many  respects  like  that 
of  the  Quakers,  and  those  who  joined  themselves  to 
that  movement,  just  beyond  the  middle  of  the  seven 
teenth  century,  adopted  the  new  name  with  hardly  a 
change  of  idea,  ideal,  or  practice.  Coddington  (b.  1601, 
d.  1678)  was  the  foremost  man  of  the  group.2  He  was 

1  The  history  of  this  controversy  is  told  in  Chapter  I. 

2  In  the  Preface  of  his  Demonstration  of  True  Love,  written  ' '  To  the  Rulers  of 
the  Colony  of  Massachusetts  "  in  1672,  Coddington  says  :   "I  was  entrusted  in 
the  first  settling  [of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  Colony]  and  with  the  chiefest  in  all 
public  charges  [i.e.  affairs]  even  before  Boston  was  named  or  any  house  therein. 
I  builded  the  first  good  house,  in  which  the  governor  now  dwells.     I  having 
spent  much  of  my  estate  and  prime  of  my  age  in  propagating  Plantations,  and 
now  come  to  the  last  period,  the  seventieth  year  of  my  age  ;  in  discharge  of  my 
conscience  toward  God  and  in  tender  love  and  due  respect  to  all,  I  write,  as  I 
have  done,  to  warn  you  of  your  general  calamity,  upon  which  I  parted  from  you, 
that  persecuting  spirit  let  loose  ;  and  I  rest  yours  in  love,  W.C." 

171 


172    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

judge  of  the  Portsmouth  Colony  until  Newport  was 
founded,  and  then  he  was  chosen  judge  of  that  Colony. 
When  the  two  Colonies  of  Portsmouth  and  Newport  were 
united  under  one  government  he  was  successively  chosen 
Governor  from  1640  to  1647.  When  the  four  Colonies 
of  Providence,  Newport,  Portsmouth,  and  Warwick  were 
united  in  one  government  under  the  charter  of  1647, 
John  Coggeshall  was  chosen  first  President.  William 
Coddington  was,  however,  elected  to  this  office  in  1648, 
but  was  afterwards  suspended  from  office,  apparently 
because  of  his  over-zealous  efforts  to  bring  the  Colony  into 
the  New  England  Confederacy,  which  he  felt  was  the 
necessary  step  for  the  fulfilment  of  the  larger  destiny  of 
the  Colony  on  the  Narragansett.  Soon  after  this  he  went 
to  England  with  large  designs  in  his  mind.  He  was 
nursing  the  dream  of  a  great  island  Colony  in  Narragansett 
Bay,  and  his  two  attempts — in  1644  and  1648 — to  bring 
the  Colony  into  the  New  England  Confederacy  had  been 
with  the  aim  to  safeguard  and  strengthen  the  infant  state. 
These  attempts  had  failed.  He  now  embarked  for 
England  with  a  still  bolder  dream  in  his  mind,  to  make 
the  Narragansett  islands  play  the  r61e  in  America  which 
the  British  islands  had  played  in  the  old  world  !  He 
assiduously  cultivated  the  friendship  of  Sir  Harry  Vane, 
formerly  his  friend  in  the  days  of  Vane's  governorship, 
dining  frequently  with  him  ;  seeking  also  the  assistance  of 
his  old  theological  opponent  Hugh  Peters,  now  a  man  of 
large  influence.  Finally,  in  spite  of  the  opposition  of 
Edward  Winslow  of  Plymouth,  Coddington  secured, 
through  the  British  Council  of  State  and  the  Committee 
of  Admiralty,  a  patent,  signed  April  1651  by  Lord 
President  Bradshaw,  making  him  proprietor  of  the  islands 
"  Aquidnet  "  [otherwise  Rhode  Island]  and  "  Quinunagate  " 
[otherwise  Conanicut]  and  Governor  for  life. 

This  act  of  Coddington's  was,  to  say  the  least,  a  rash 
act,  a  profound  blunder,  and  the  colonists  of  Rhode  Island 
and  Providence  Plantations  denied  his  authority  and  sent 
John  Clarke,  a  man  of  great  parts,  a  genuine  apostle  of 
soul  liberty  and  a  wise  diplomatist,  to  England  to  get  the 


CH.  vin        THE  QUAKERS   IN   POLITICS  173 

Coddington  charter  annulled.1  In  1656  Coddington,  in 
honourable  and  manly  fashion,  retreated  from  his  mis 
taken  course.  He  was  never  a  traitor,  as  Turner  assumes,2 
and  wrote  a  letter  engaging  to  submit  "  with  all  his 
heart "  to  the  lawful  authority  in  the  Colony,  he  having 
already  in  1652  signed  a  paper  surrendering  all  claim  to 
anything  more  than  his  own  share  of  the  island  of 
Aquidneck.8  From  this  time  to  his  death  he  was 
prominent  in  the  affairs  of  the  Colony,  and,  as  we  shall 
see,  steadily  received  the  mark  of  public  confidence,  and 
was  raised  to  the  highest  office  in  the  gift  of  the  people. 
Weeden,  in  his  valuable  volume,4  declares  that  Coddington 
was  "  a  man  of  substance  materially  and  mentally.  Judge 
Durfee  considers  that  the  well-organised  judiciary  of  the 
island  betokens  the  presence  of  some  man  having  not 
only  a  large  legal  and  legislative  capacity,  but  also  a 
commanding  influence.  It  was  probably  Coddington. 
It  is  more  than  doubtful  whether  Rhode  Island  could 
have  attained  a  stable  government  without  Coddington's 
effort." 

Nicholas  Easton  (b.  1592,  d.  1675)  built  the  first 
house  in  Newport.  He  was  one  of  the  nineteen  signers 
of  the  Aquidneck  Colonial  "  Contract,"  and  his  is  the 
second  name  on  the  "  Agreement "  of  the  Newport 
Colony.  He  and  John  Clarke  were  appointed  in  1639 
to  correspond  with  Sir  Harry  Vane  upon  the  state  of 
affairs  in  the  new  Colony.  He  was  elected  "  Assistant " 
from  1640  to  1644.  He  was  President  of  the  Colony 
in  1650,  1651,  and  1654,  and  he  was  thus  prepared  for 
the  larger  services  to  which  he  was  called  in  his  distinctly 
Quaker  period. 

Sometime  between  1657  and  1660 — the  evidence 
seems  to  point  to  the  former  date  as  the  time — 
Coddington,  Nicholas  Easton,  John  Easton,  Joshua 

1  Roger  Williams  went  with  Clarke  as  representative  of  the  mainland  towns. 

-  See  article  by  Henry  E.  Turner,  hostile  to  Coddington,  in  Rhode  Island 
Tracts,  No.  4. 

8  See  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,  \.  327.  He  was  that  year  elected  a 
commissioner  to  the  General  Court,  which  would  not  have  happened  if  the  people 
of  Newport  had  not  believed  in  his  integrity. 

4  Weeden's  Early  Rhode  Island  (N.Y.,  1910),  p.  64. 


174    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Coggeshall  (son  of  John  who  had  died  in  office  in  1647), 
Walter  Clarke,  Caleb  Carr,  and  many  other  leading 
citizens  of  the  island-colony,  joined  the  Quaker  movement 
with  their  families,  and  at  once  gave  the  persecuted  people 
the  support  of  their  names  and  their  influence.  It  is 
interesting  to  note  that  their  affiliation  with  the  religious 
movement,  so  unpopular  everywhere  else,  had  from  the 
first  no  detrimental  effect  upon  the  political  career  of  the 
men  who  joined  the  Quaker  meeting  at  Newport. 
Nicholas  Easton  and  his  son  John  Easton  were  both 
elected  commissioners  to  the  General  Court  of  Rhode 
Island  and  Providence  Plantations  in  1660,  and  Nicholas 
was  chosen  Moderator  of  the  Court  that  year,  and  John  was 
made  Attorney-General,  a  position  to  which  he  was  many 
times  elected  until  1674,  when  he  was  raised  to  a  higher 
office.  The  following  year,  1661,  Caleb  Carr  was  elected 
Treasurer- General  of  the  Colony,  and  he  likewise  continued 
to  hold  a  prominent  place  in  the  affairs  of  the  Colony 
until  he  was  finally  chosen  Governor  in  1695. 

Nicholas  Easton  was  the  first  Quaker  to  be  raised  to 
the  governorship  of  the  Colony,  he  having  been  already 
five  times  Deputy-Governor,  beginning  with  the  year  I666.1 
His  term  of  office  as  Governor  extended  from  1672  to 
1674.  It  was  his  lot,  as  it  was  also  that  of  the  later 
Quaker  Governors,  to  come  into  public  prominence  at  the 
critical  time  of  war.  This  period,  from  1666  to  1674, 
when  Easton  was  almost  continuously  in  public  office, 
was  disturbed  by  two  wars  between  England  and  Holland, 
and  the  Colonies  which  were  within  easy  reach  of  the 
Dutch  in  New  Amsterdam  were  continually  harassed 
with  anxiety,  even  though  not  actually  involved  in 
border  warfare.  The  first  Dutch  war  of  Charles  II.'s  reign 
began  in  1664,  and  was  ended  by  the  Peace  of  Breda  in 
1667.  The  second  war  began  in  1672  and  was  ter 
minated  in  1674,  permanently  settling  New  York  as 
English  territory.  The  wars  between  the  mother-country 
and  the  continental  nations  were  complicated  by  alliances 

1  The  Great  Charter  of  Rhode  Island,  secured  from  King  Charles  the  Second, 
had  gone  into  operation  in  1663. 


CH.  viii        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  175 

of  Indian  tribes  against  the  English  colonists,  and  the 
Rhode  Island  Quaker  officials  must  many  times  have  had 
their  consciences  severely  tested  in  these  periods  when 
preparation  for  war  was  forced  upon  them.  Left  to  them 
selves  the  Rhode  Island  colonists  could  have  maintained 
peace,  for  their  Indian  policy  was  wise,  humane,  and 
enlightened,  and  gained  for  them  the  confidence  and 
love  of  their  Indian  neighbours.1  But  they  were  a  tiny 
part  of  a  larger  political  system.  They  could  not  live 
unto  themselves.  They  received  their  Charter  from  the 
English  Government,  and  they  were  of  necessity  involved 
in  the  schemes  and  quarrels  of  the  mother-country  as 
well  as  in  the  expanding  movements  of  the  Colonies 
surrounding  them,  and,  try  as  they  might  to  keep  their 
domain  in  peace,  they  found  themselves  dragged  into  the 
grinding  millstones  of  war. 

The  Quaker  officials  in  the  Rhode  Island  Colony  were 
in  every  instance  devoted  to  the  maintenance  of  peace. 
They  exerted  themselves  to  the  utmost  to  keep  the 
Colony  out  of  actual  war  ;  but  they  seem  to  have  settled 
it  as  their  policy  to  stay  in  office,  when  they  were  put 
there  by  the  people,  even  though  they  found  themselves 
compelled,  by  unavoidable  conditions  and  circumstances, 
to  perform  public  acts  of  a  warlike  nature.  When  they 
found  that  the  great  current  of  events  could  not  be  forced 
to  take  the  course  which  in  their  vision  seemed  the  ideal 
one,  they  faced  the  stubborn  conditions  that  existed  and 
did  the  best  they  could  with  them.  They  discovered, 
what  all  practical  workers  discover,  that  the  achievement 
of  great  ends  and  high  ideals  can  be  won  only  by  slow 
stages  and  by  graceful  bends  around  obstacles  which  are 
for  the  moment  immovable.  There  has  always  been  in 
the  Society  of  Friends  a  group  of  persons  pledged 
unswervingly  to  the  ideal.  To  those  who  form  this  inner 
group  compromise  is  under  no  circumstance  allowable. 

1  One  of  the  significant  acts  of  Nicholas  Easton's  administration  as  Governor 
was  the  order  that  one-half  of  the  jury  which  was  to  try  an  Indian  for  murder 
should  be  composed  of  Indians,  and  that  Indian  testimony  should  be  received 
on  the  same  basis  as  the  testimony  of  Englishmen.  See  Arnold's  History  of  Rhode 
Island,  i.  367. 


1 76    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

If  there  comes  a  collision  between  allegiance  to  the  ideal 
and  the  holding  of  public  office,  then  the  office  must  be 
deserted.  If  obedience  to  the  soul's  vision  involves  eye 
or  hand,  houses  or  lands  or  life,  they  must  be  immediately 
surrendered.  But  there  has  always  been  as  well  another 
group  who  have  held  it  to  be  equally  imperative  to  work 
out  their  principles  of  life  in  the  complex  affairs  of  the 
community  and  the  State,  where  to  gain  an  end  one 
must  yield  something  ;  where  to  get  on  one  must  submit 
to  existing  conditions ;  and  where  to  achieve  ultimate 
triumph  one  must  risk  his  ideals  to  the  tender  mercies 
of  a  world  not  yet  ripe  for  them.  John  Woolman, 
the  consummate  flower  of  American  Quakerism  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  is  the  shining  type  of  the  former 
principle,  and  the  Rhode  Island  governors  are  good  types 
of  the  other  course. 

Nicholas  Easton  was  the  first  to  face  this  hard  issue 
of  war,  and  his  policy,  distinctly  at  variance  with  that 
later  pursued  by  the  Pennsylvania  Quakers,  was  followed 
by  all  the  Quaker  governors  of  Rhode  Island. 

By  act  of  the  General  Court  the  I3th  of  May  1667, 
he  was  appointed  chairman  of  a  committee  to  make  a 
rate  for  the  levying  of  ^150  for  the  defence  of  Newport 
against  a  common  enemy,  and  for  "  mounting  the  great 
gun,"  "  in  order  to  prevent  such  mischiefs  and  miseries 
as  may  happen  for  the  want  of  the  same." l  It  appears 
from  the  Records  that  the  Quaker  Deputy-Governor  did 
not  help  to  "  mount  the  great  gun,"  as  it  was  mounted 
by  the  military  men  of  the  Colony.2 

Just  before  Nicholas  Easton  was  raised  to  the  governor 
ship  the  Colony  was  believed  to  be  in  imminent  danger 
of  aggressive  attack,  as  the  following  record  of  the  General 
Court  shows : 

"  August  31,  1671. — There  being  a  great  necessity  to  put  the 
Colony  in  a  posture  of  defence  att  this  time,  wherein  there  are 
soe  apparent  grounds  to  expect  some  treacherous  designes  and 

1  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,   ii.  197.      Daniel  Gould,  John  Gould,  and 
Peter  Easton,  all  Friends,  were  on  this  committee. 
8  Ibid. 


CH.  vm        THE  QUAKERS   IN  POLITICS  177 

practices  from  the  Indians,  itt  is  therefore  ordered,  that  the 
Towne  Councills  and  Councills  of  Warr,  of  each  respective  towne 
on  the  Island,  shall  meete  at  Mr.  Geo.  Lawton's  dwelling-house 
in  the  bounds  of  Portsmouth,  on  Tuesday,  the  fifth  day  of 
September,  now  next  insueing,  at  nine  of  the  clock  in  the  fore 
noon,  then  and  there  to  consider  of  some  wayes  and  means  for 
secureing  the  inhabitants  and  their  estates  in  these  times  of 
imminent  danger." l 

That  was  surely  a  difficult  time  for  the  infant  state, 
and  it  was  a  hard  crisis  for  the  beginning  of  a  Quaker 
administration.  The  new  "  administration  "  was,  however, 
prevailingly  Quaker.  Nicholas  Easton  was  Governor, 
John  Cranston,  Deputy-Governor,2  John  Easton,  son  of 
Nicholas,  was  Attorney-General,  and  Joshua  Coggeshall, 
John  Easton,  and  Peter  Easton  were  assistants.  One  of 
the  first  acts  of  the  Council  under  this  Quaker  administra 
tion  looked  toward  preparation  for  the  military  defence 
of  the  Colony,  though  here  again  we  have  no  way  of 
knowing  what  part,  active  or  passive,  the  Quaker  members 
actually  took.  The  Act  reads  : 

"  Whereas,  wee  have  received  speciall  order  from  his  Majestic 
for  the  Proclamation  of  Warr  against  the  Dutch,  and  the  puttinge 
this  Collony  into  a  posture  of  defence,  this  Councill  doe  recom 
mend  and  doe  order  and  empower  the  Magistrates,  together  with 
the  Captain,  Lieutenant,  and  Ensigne  of  the  respective  townes, 
or  the  major  part  of  them,  to  take  care,  order,  and  putt  the 
inhabitants  of  each  towne  into  the  best  posture  of  defence  may 
be,  for  the  maintaininge  the  King's  interest  in  this  Collony  ;  and 
to  that  end,  to  act  and  order  to  the  best  of  their  discretion,  until 
the  Generall  Assembly  or  Councill  take  further  order;  and 
especially  to  take  care  for  powder,  shott,  and  ammunition,  and 
to  inquire  after  and  secure  what  may  be  found  in  the  Collony." 8 

At  the  election  of  1673,  when  the  war  was  at  its 
height,  when  the  Colony  was  in  feverish  anxiety,  and  when 
the  coolest  heads  were  needed  in  counsel,  Easton  was 
again  elected  Governor,  William  Coddington  was  chosen 
Deputy-Governor,  and  Walter  Clarke,  one  of  the  foremost 

1  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,  ii.  409. 

2  John    Cranston  was   not  a  Friend  in  membership  though  he  attended  the 
Yearly  Meeting  in  1672.     See  Fox's  Journal  (edition  1901)  ii.  168. 

3  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,  ii.  463. 

N 


i;8    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

members  of  the  Newport  meeting,  was  added  to  the  list 
of  assistants. 

The  Dutch  succeeded  in  recapturing  New  York  on 
the  3<Dth  of  July  1673,  and  this  caused  much  commotion 
in  Newport.  A  special  session  of  the  General  Assembly 
was  called  to  provide  for  the  defence  of  the  Colony,  and 
many  military  measures  were  passed.  The  following  Act 
would  certainly  put  a  peace-loving  Quaker  in  a  hard 
dilemma : 

"Voted,  forasmuch  as  there  seemeth  a  present  danger  by 
reason  of  the  Dutch  forces,  whoe  the  30th  of  July  last  tooke 
New  Yorke,  and  may  unhappily  assault  and  fall  upon  us,  as  a 
ready  provision  and  fittings  against  such  said  danger : 

"It  is  enacted,  that  authority  is  given  to  the  Governor,  and 
in  his  absence  to  the  Deputy-Governor,  and  major  part  of  the 
assistants,  for  the  time  beinge  (at  any  time  when  the  Generall 
Assembly  is  not  sittinge),  to  nominate,  appoint,  and  constitute 
such  and  soe  many  commanders,  and  military  officers  as  to  them 
shall  seeme  requisite  for  the  leadinge,  conductinge,  and  trayninge 
up  the  inhabitants  of  the  said  Plantation  in  martiall  affaires." 

And  it  was  further  enacted : 

"that  the  Governor  or,  in  his  absence,  the  Deputy-Governor, 
[both  Quakers]  and  all  the  Assistants  on  this  Island,  if  the 
Dutch  or  any  other  public  enemy  shall,  in  open  hostility  against 
the  King,  assault  it  or  fall  upon  his  subjects  here ;  then  all  of 
them,  if  able  and  in  health,  shall  in  all  time  of  danger  be  with 
or  as  neere  as  may  be  convenient  to  the  eldest  Captaine  in 
chiefe  [John  Cranston]  to  give  to  him  speciall  and  perticular 
directions  as  the  danger  shall  then  occasion,  for  the  safety  of  the 
whole ;  and  the  Governor,  or  Deputy-Governor,  and  all  the 
Assistants  on  the  Island  that  shall  be  able,  shall  with  the  first 
information,  allarm,  or  knowledge  of  the  approach  or  invasion 
of  the  said  enemy  come  together  and  be  ready  in  the  most 
convenient  place  to  consult  and  agree  how  for  the  best  safety 
and  best  loyalty  to  answer  any  summons  such  said  enemy  may 
send  to  them." l 

The  Assembly  thereupon  proceeded  to  draft  a  pension 
law  for  the  "  reliefe  of  souldiers  that  lose  their  limbs  and 
the  reliefe  for  the  relations  whose  dependency  was  on 

1  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,  ii.  489. 


CH.  vni        THE  QUAKERS   IN  POLITICS  179 

such  as  are  slayne  " — one  of  the  earliest  American  pension 
laws.  In  the  next  Act  the  hand  of  the  Quakers  is  plainly 
seen.  They  had  been  unable  to  stop  the  occasion  of  the 
present  war,  and  they  were  powerless  to  prevent  the  war 
like  preparations  for  the  defence  of  those  who  believed 
in  the  propriety  of  war,  but  they  now  made  full  provision 
for  the  relief  of  tender  consciences.  This  Act  of  exemp 
tion  from  military  duties  for  conscience'  sake,  passed  the 
1 3th  of  August  1673 — the  first  Act  of  the  sort  ever 
passed  in  America, — is  a  very  curious  and  quaint  document 
full  of  odd  Scripture  texts  and  allusions,  but  it  is  too  long 
to  be  given  in  full. 

The  Act  declares  that  "  the  inhabitants  of  this  colony 
have  a  conscience "  against  requiring  taking  an  oath, 
"  how  much  more,"  it  adds,  "  ought  such  men  forbear  to 
compel  their  equal  neighbors  against  their  consciences  to 
trayne  to  fight  and  to  kill." 

"  Bee  it  therefore  enacted,  and  hereby  it  is  enacted  by  his 
Majesty's  authority,  that  noe  person  (within  this  Collony),  that 
is  or  hereafter  shall  be  persuaded  in  his  conscience  that  he 
cannot  or  ought  not  to  trayne,  to  learne  to  fight,  nor  to  war,  nor 
kill  any  person  or  persons,  shall  at  any  time  be  compelled  against 
his  judgment  and  conscience  to  trayne,  arm,  or  fight,  to  kill  any 
person  or  persons  by  reason  of  or  at  the  command  of  any  officer 
of  this  Collony,  civil  nor  military,  nor  by  reason  of  any  by-law 
here  past  or  formerly  enacted ;  nor  shall  suffer  any  punishment, 
fine,  distraint,  pennalty,  nor  imprisonment,  who  cannot  in  con 
science  traine,  fight,  nor  kill  any  person  nor  persons  for  the 
aforesaid  reasons." : 

At  the  next  general  election  William  Coddington  was 
chosen  Governor,  and  John  Easton  Deputy -Governor, 
while  Peter  Easton  filled  both  offices  of  Attorney-General 
and  Colonial  Treasurer.  Shortly  before  his  election  to 
the  governorship  Coddington  had  built  himself  a  great 
house  in  Marlborough  Street.  It  was  spacious  and 
adapted  for  the  entertainment  of  many  visitors.  In  the 
great  room  of  this  house  the  Quaker  meeting  of  Newport 
was  held  for  many  years,  and  at  the  time  of  George  Fox's 
visit  the  Yearly  Meeting  was  held  there,  and  in  this  house 

1  This  Act  is  in  the  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  ii.  495-499. 


i8o    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Coddington  entertained  the  Governor  of  Massachusetts, 
Richard  Bellingham,  on  his  memorable  visit  to  Rhode 
Island.1  Soon  after  the  election  which  freed  him  from 
the  responsibility  of  public  office,  Nicholas  Easton  passed 
away  full  of  years  and  having  achieved  the  highest  honours 
his  Colony  had  to  bestow.  He  had  helped  form  the 
infant  settlement  in  Newbury,  Massachusetts ;  he  had 
built  the  first  English  house  in  Hampton  ;  he  had  bravely 
followed  his  light  in  the  trying  days  which  parted  the 
Puritan  colony  into  two  religious  groups,  and  he  had  been 
in  the  front  line  of  the  pioneers  of  religious  freedom  on 
Rhode  Island.  He  had  built  the  first  house  in  Newport, 
the  first  windmill  on  the  island  ;  and  he  had  been  among 
the  first  to  throw  in  his  lot  with  the  new-born  Quaker 
Society.  He  had  been  the  constant  companion  of  George 
Fox  in  his  two  months  of  labour  in  New  England,  and 
he  had  finished  the  course  of  an  eventful  life  by  piloting 
his  Colony  through  two  administrations  complicated  by 
the  problems  of  imminent  war. 

During  Easton's  period  of  public  service  the  Colony 
was  swept  by  a  cyclonic  disturbance  of  internal  contention. 
The  colonial  records  describe  it  as  "an  uncomfortable 
difference  of  which  there  seemed  to  be  no  peaceable 
composure "  ;  as  "  dangerous  contests,  distractions,  and 
divisions  among  our  ancient,  loving,  and  honoured  neigh 
bours,  the  freemen  of  the  town  of  Providence,  by  which 
the  town  is  in  an  incapacity  of  transacting  its  own  affairs," 
making  "  a  breech  in  the  whole."  2  This  bitter  quarrel 
had  broken  out  over  William  Harris'  claim  of  ownership 
to  extensive  lands  stretching  up  the  Pawtuxet  River  and 
other  streams.  Harris  was  a  strenuous  man  of  affairs, 
"  pertinacious  in  temperament,"  and  inclined  to  be  a  local 
storm-centre.  His  opponents,  in  the  pamphleteering 
manner  of  the  times,  called  him  "  a  fire-brand,"  "  a 
salamander  always  delighting  to  live  in  ye  fire  of  con- 

1  ' '  Did  I  not  entertain  Richard  Bellingham  and  his  company  nine  or  ten  days 
in  my  house  on  Rhode  Island  ?  " — A  Demonstration  of  True  Love,  p.  15.  The 
first  Friends'  Meeting- House  in  Newport  was  already  built  in  1672,  but  many  of 
the  meetings  were  still  held  in  Coddington's  house.  Stephen  Gould,  who  saw 
this  house  torn  down,  has  left  a  very  interesting  sketch  of  its  history. 

8  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  ii.  289-293. 


CH.  vm        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  181 

tention,"  "  a  raging  sea  casting  forth  mire  and  dirt ! " l 
He,  in  turn,  called  them — the  Roger  Williams  faction 
and  the  Fenner  party — "  the  makers  of  poysonous 
plaisters  against  our  rights  in  lands  and  laws."  So  fierce 
was  the  storm  that  a  special  session  of  the  General 
Assembly  was  called,  and  two  Newport  Quakers,  John 
Easton  and  Joshua  Coggeshall,  were  "  chosen  and  author 
ised  "  to  call  a  Providence  town  meeting  in  the  name  of 
the  General  Assembly,  superintend  the  choice  of  officers, 
and  bring  civil  order  out  of  the  chaos — a  delicate  and 
difficult  task  which  was  in  the  end  successfully  carried 
through.2 

As  Coddington  began  his  administration  news  came  to 
the  Colony  that  peace  was  established  between  England 
and  Holland,  and  the  strain  and  anxiety  of  war  seemed 
happily  over.  One  disturbance  disquieted  the  Colony. 
There  were  visible  signs  that  Rhode  Island  was  to  have 
difficulty  in  establishing  its  rightful  claim  to  the  Narra- 
gansett  country  on  the  west  shore  of  the  Bay — a  region 
for  many  years  in  hot  dispute.  One  of  the  new  Governor's 
first  acts  was  to  proceed  with  his  council  to  the  district  in 
dispute  and  to  establish  there  the  township  of  Kingstown 
(now  called  Kingston),  which  was  incorporated  by  the 
General  Assembly  as  the  seventh  town  of  Rhode  Island. 
After  one  peaceful  term  of  office  William  Coddington  was 
re-elected,  but  the  days  of  peace  and  calm  were  over,  and 
his  second  term  of  office  was  destined  to  see  the  fiercest 
storm  of  Indian  war  which  the  New  England  Colonies 
ever  experienced — the  contest  known  in  history  as  "  King 
Philip's  War." 

This  war  was  the  natural  outcome  of  the  irresistible 
collision  of  two  races,  two  civilisations,  incompatible  with 
each  other.  The  collision  came  at  this  particular  crisis 
because  the  Indian  cause  just  then  happened  to  be 
embodied  in  a  great  natural  leader  of  men  in  the  person 
of  the  Indian  chief,  King  Philip,  son  of  Massasoit.  Philip 

1  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society  Collection,  x.  78. 

3  Lott  Strange  and  Joseph  Torrey  were  added  to  the  committee  of  two  ' '  for 
Counsel  and  Advice,"  Records,  ii.  293.  Harris  himself  became  a  Quaker  after 
George  Fox's  visit  to  the  Colony. 


1 82    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

believed  that  he  had  been  greatly  wronged  by  the 
English,  especially  those  of  Plymouth  Colony,  and  he  saw 
no  hope  of  gaining  the  old  time  rights,  privileges,  and 
conditions  of  Indian  life,  except  by  a  master  stroke  at 
the  life  of  the  English  settlers. 

It  was  always  the  Quaker  way  to  endeavour  to  prevent 
war  by  removing  the  occasion  for  it,  and  the  Quakers  in 
authority  at  this  crisis  made  a  vigorous  trial  of  their 
method.  As  the  sky  was  darkening  with  ominous  clouds 
of  war,  five  men,  with  John  Easton,  the  Deputy-Governor 
of  the  Colony  of  Rhode  Island,  at  their  head,  rowed  up 
to  King  Philip's  headquarters  at  Mount  Hope — a  pro 
montory  jutting  into  Narragansett  Bay — to  try  counsel 
and  persuasion  with  him  in  order  to  bring  about,  if 
possible,  an  arbitration  of  the  difficulties. 

The  five  visitors  all  came  to  the  council  unarmed,  and 
Philip  laid  aside  his  weapons  for  the  occasion,  though  his 
warriors,  about  forty  in  number,  were  armed  ;  and  Easton, 
who  wrote  the  only  account  of  this  famous  conference, 
says  :  "  We  sat  veri  friendly  together.  We  told  him  our 
bisness  was  to  indever  that  they  [the  Indians]  might  not 
receve  or  do  rong." l  "  We  told  them,"  the  narrative 
continues,  "  that  our  desire  was  that  the  quarrel  might  be 
rightly  decided  in  the  best  way,  not  as  dogs  decide  their 
quarrels."  The  Indians  "owned  that  fighting  was  the 
worst  way,  but  they  inquired  how  right  might  take  place 
without  fighting.  We  said  by  arbitration.  They  said 
that  by  arbitration  the  English  agreed  against  them,  and 
so  by  arbitration  they  had  much  rong." 2  "  We  said  they 
might  chuse  a  Indian  King  and  the  English  might  chuse 
the  Governor  of  New  Yorke,  that  neither  had  case  to  say 
that  either  wear  parties  to  the  difference.  They  said  they 
had  not  heard  of  this  way.  We  were  persuaded  that  if 
this  way  had  been  tendered  they  would  have  accepted."8 

Philip  then  proceeded  to  spread  before  them  a  long 
list  of  Indian  grievances.  Philip  said :  "  Their  King's 
father  [Massasoit],  when  the  English  first  came,  was  a 

1  Easton's  Narrative  (Hough  edition),  p.  7.     This  narrative  is  a  marvellous 
specimen  of  seventeenth-century  spelling  ! 

«  Ibid.  p.  8.  3  Ibid.  p.  10. 


CH.  vm        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  183 

great  man  and  the  English  as  a  littill  child.  He  con 
strained  the  other  Indians  from  ronging  the  English,  and 
gave  them  corn  and  shewed  them  how  to  plant  it  and  was 
free  to  do  them  ani  good."  "  But  their  King's  brother 
[Alexander],  when  he  was  King  came  miserably  to  dy, 
being  forced  to  court,  and  as  they  judged  poysoned." 
"  Another  Greavance  was,  if  20  of  their  onest  Indiands 
testified  that  a  Englishman  had  dun  them  rong  it  was 
nothing,  but  if  one  of  their  worst  Indians  testified  against 
any  Indian,  or  their  King,  when  it  pleased  the  English,  it 
was  suficiant."  Finally  Philip  complained  that  the 
English  were  "  eager  to  sell  the  Indians  lickers  [liquors] 
that  most  Indians  spent  all  in  drynknes  and  then  raved 
upon  the  sober  Indians  ! " 1 

The  visitors  pleaded  all  day  for  arbitration,  but  there 
seemed  no  practical  way  of  bringing  it  about,  for  the  five 
counsellors  were  incapable  of  convincing  the  Indians  that 
they  could  bring  the  other  Colonies  to  their  peaceful  view, 
and  Easton  concludes  his  Narrative,  written  while  the 
war  was  in  progress,  with  the  sectarian  remark : 

"  I  am  persuaded  of  New  England  Frists  [ministers]  they  are 
so  blinded  by  the  spirit  of  Persecution  and  [so  eager]  to  maintain 
their  hyer  [hire]  that  they  have  been  the  case  [cause]  that  the  law 
of  Nations  and  the  Law  of  Arems  have  been  violated  in  this 
War  [war  was  begun  without  any  formal  declaration].  The  war 
would  not  have  been  if  ther  had  not  bine  hyerlings."  2 

Upon  the  very  heels  of  this  conference  the  storm 
broke  with  fury  upon  the  inhabitants  who  lived  along  the 
shores  of  the  bay.8  The  Quakers  of  Rhode  Island  held 
the  view  throughout  the  conflict  that  it  was  an  unnecessary 
war,  and  might  have  been  avoided  if  the  other  Colonies 
had  shown  Philip  fair  treatment,  but  in  any  case  the 
innocent  were  involved  with  those  who  were  responsible 
for  the  calamity,  and  the  mainland  of  Rhode  Island  came 

1  Easton's  Narrative  (Hough  edition),  pp.  12,  13.  z  Ibid.  pp.  30,  31. 

3  King  Philip's  war  began  24th  June  1675,  the  Easton  Conference  occurred 
1 7th  June.  The  Narragansett  Indians  were  most  kindly  disposed  toward  the 
Friends  on  the  Island.  The  Indian  chief  Pessicus  told  the  Newport  magistrates 
that  his  heart  was  affected  and  sorrowed  for  the  English,  but  "he  could  not  rule 
[i.e.  overrule]  the  young  Indians  nor  persuade  the  other  chiefs." 


184    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    me.  i 

in  for  a  heavy  share  of  the  suffering.  It  was  the  Quaker 
policy  to  make  the  Island  a  safe  city  of  refuge,  and  to 
bring  the  outlying  inhabitants  thither.1  Providence  and 
Warwick  sent  urgent  appeals  for  military  assistance,  and 
the  General  Assembly  of  1676  answered  them  through  a 
committee  of  six,  of  which  the  Quakers,  Walter  Clarke, 
Joshua  Coggeshall,  and  Caleb  Carr  were  members,  as 
follows : 

"  After  searious  debate  and  well  weighings  of  your  hazardous 
and  present  condition,  wee  declare  that  wee  finde  this  Collony  is 
not  of  ability  to  maintaine  sufficient  garrisons  for  the  security  of 
our  out-Plantations.  Therefore,  we  thinke  and  judge  it  most  safe 
for  the  inhabitants  to  repaire  to  this  Island,  which  is  the  most 
secureist.  Newport  and  Portsmouth  inhabitants  have  taken 
such  care  that  those  of  the  Collony  that  come,  and  cannot 
procure  land  to  plant  for  themselves  and  families,  reliefe  may  be 
supplied  with  land  by  the  townes ;  and  each  family  soe  wantinge 
a  Hbertye,  shall  have  a  cow  kept  upon  the  commons ;  butt  if 
any  of  you  think  yourselves  of  abillity  to  keepe  your  interest  of 
houses  and  cattell,  and  will  adventure  your  lives  [by  staying 
where  you  are]  we  shall  not  positively  oppose  you  therein ;  but 
this  the  Assembly  declares  as  their  sense  and  reall  beliefe  con- 
cerninge  the  premises,  that  those  that  soe  doth  make  themselves 
a  prey,  and  what  they  have  as  goods,  provisions,  ammunition, 
cattell,  etc.,  will  be  a  reliefe  to  the  enemy  at  their  pleasure, 
except  more  than  ordinary  Providence  prevent,  therefore  we 
cannot  but  judge  them  wisest  that  take  the  safest  course  to 
secure  themselves,  and  take  the  occasion  from  the  enemy."  2 

There  exists  a  very  odd  letter,  signed  by  Walter 
Clarke,  written  28th  January  1676,  which  further  indicates 
the  Quaker  policy.  It  is  in  answer  to  an  appeal  for 
assistance  from  Providence.  Clarke  endeavours  to 
quiet  "  the  discontent  of  spirit "  which  prevailed  in 
Providence  toward  the  Newport  authorities,  "  as  if  they 
were  not  worthy  to  live,"  by  explaining  that  "  the  weal  of 
the  Colony  "  would  have  been  attended  to  if  the  weather 

1  Drake's  Old  Indian  Chronicle  says,  "Rhode  Island  now  became  the 
common  /oar,  or  place  of  refuge  for  the  distressed, "  p.  224.  A  minute  of  the 
executive  council  of  New  York  of  this  date  says  that  ' '  Great  Numbers  of  the 
people  flock t  to  Rhode  Island  from  their  habitations  destroyed,  insomuch  that 
the  inhabitants  [of  the  island]  are  very  much  straitened  by  their  numbers,  and 
will  quickly  want  provisions. " 

a  Colony  Records  of  Rhode  Island,  ii.  532-535. 


CH.  via        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  185 

had  not  "  obstructed  "  the  execution  of  orders  for  defence. 
He  further  offers  the  explanation,  certainly  not  very 
satisfactory  to  the  sufferers,  that  if  the  "  Administration  " 
had  furnished  soldiers  to  protect  "  the  out-inhabitants  "  and 
their  property,  the  people  would  have  been  "  damnified  by 
the  charge  for  wages,  ammunition,  and  diet ! "  "  The 
island,"  he  says,  "  has  expended  eight  hundred  pounds  to 
provide  for  the  security  and  provision  of  those  who  are 
there ;  and  all  who  cannot  be  secure  where  they  are  "  had 
best  be  transported  hither,"  "  for  we  are  not  of  ability  to 
keep  soldiers  under  pay."  "  Sorrows  are  to  increase,"  he 
thinks,  and  to  have  soldiers  to  pay  and  care  for  would 
only  add  to  the  troubles  of  the  already  heavy  times.  He 
warns  them  not  to  appeal  for  help  to  the  other  Colonies, 
for  they  will  in  the  end  "  make  a  prey  of  you  " — there 
was  apparently  no  help  left  for  the  suffering  "out- 
inhabitants,"  but  to  wait  for  the  salvation  of  the  Lord ! 
This  curious  sentence  was  perhaps  meant  to  be  a  comfort : 

"  I  have  done  to  the  uttermost  of  my  ability  for  your  good 
and  shall  do,  yet  we  know  the  Lord's  hand  is  against  New 
England  [evidently  Massachusetts  and  Plymouth]  and  no 
weapon  formed  will  prosper  till  the  work  be  finished,  and  the 
wheat  [the  Rhode  Island  saints !]  must  be  pulled  up  with  the 
tears  [tares]  and  the  innocent  suffer  with  the  guilty ! " 1 

On  the  1 2th  of  April  the  same  year,  Walter  Clarke 
wrote  again,  in  a  somewhat  more  encouraging  vein,  with 
less  religious  comment  and  with  more  practical  direction  : 

"  Only  this  for  your  present  encouragement :  we  well  approve 
your  advice  and  willingness  to  maintain  a  garrison,  and  have 
agreed  to  bear  the  charge  of  ten  men  upon  the  Colony's  account, 
till  the  succeeding  authority  take  further  order,2  and  that  you 
may  take  four  of  our  men  to  strengthen  you,  or  if  it  be  wholly 
by  yourselves,  we,  as  abovesaid,  will  bear  the  charge  of  ten  of 
them,  and  after  the  election,  if  those  concerned  see  cause,  and 
the  Colony  be  of  ability  to  do  it,  I  shall  not  obstruct,  if  it  be 
continued  all  the  year.  Be  pleased  to  dispatch  our  ketch.3  I 

1  Clarke's  letter  is  printed  in  Staples'  Annals,  p.  167. 

2  General  election  was  about   to  occur,   at  which  the  writer  of  the  letter, 
Walter  Clarke,  was  elected  Governor. 

8  A  "  ketch"  was  a  strong  two-masted  vessel,  generally  carrying  guns. 


186    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

have  no  more  to  you  but  my  kind  love  and  desire  of  your  peace 
and  safety  as  my  own.  WALTER  CLARKE.1 

A  carefully  planned  attack  was  made  on  the  Indians 
by  the  colonial  forces  at  South  Kingston,  near  Tower  Hill, 
in  the  winter  of  1675.  It  was  a  fierce  engagement,  68  of 
the  English  being  killed  and  150  wounded.  The 
wounded  were  brought  across  to  the  Island,  where  they 
were  kindly  cared  for.  Drake's  Old  Indian  Chronicle 
says  that  "  Governor  William  Coddington  received  the 
wounded  soldiers  kindly,  though  some  churlish  Quakers 
were  not  free  to  entertain  them  until  compelled  by  the 
Governor.2  Coddington  at  this  time  wrote  a  letter  to  the 
Governor  and  Council  of  Massachusetts  in  a  Postscript  to 
which  he  contrasts  the  way  the  Quakers  have  treated  the 
suffering  soldiers  of  Massachusetts  with  the  way  the 
people  of  Boston  have  treated,  and  are  treating,  the 
Quakers  there.  The  letter  itself  is  very  laconic  : 

"The  Governor  and  Councell  of  ye  Massachusetts  and 
Committee  of  ye  United  Colonies  writing  to  us  do  give  us 
thanks  for  transporting  their  soldiers  and  Provisions,  and  that 
sloops  transported  their  wounded,  and  desired  us  to  lett  out 
100  or  200  Souldiers,  we  answered  you  denying  soe  to  do  and 
gave  you  our  Grounds." 

The  Postscript,  for  which  the  letter  was  evidently 
written,  deals  with  a  contemporary  Boston  proclamation 
for  a  day  of  humiliation,  in  which  proclamation  was  given 
a  list  of  Puritan  "  sins  "  that  had  brought  this  war  upon 
the  nation  as  a  judgment.  The  curious  catalogue  of  sins 
included  :  neglect  to  catechise  the  young,  excess  in 
apparel,  wearing  of  long  hair,  rudeness  in  worship,  such 
as,  for  example,  the  practice  of  leaving  the  church  before 
divine  service  had  ended,  and  the  recent  neglect  to  suppress 
the  Quakers  and  their  meetings.  To  show  that  the 
proclamation  was  no  empty  call  to  repentance,  a  law  was 
simultaneously  passed  imposing  a  fine  of  five  pounds 

1  Staples'  Annals,  p.  167. 

a  Old  Indian  Chronicle  (Boston  edition,  1867),  p.  211.  These  Quakers 
believed  the  war  thoroughly  unjust,  and  desired  to  withhold  from  all  acts  which 
might  seem  like  taking  part  in  the  war,  though  in  declining  to  nurse  wounded 
soldiers  they  were  surely  pushing  their  scruples  too  far. 


CH.  viii        THE  QUAKERS  IN   POLITICS  187 

upon  every  person  who  should  attend  a  Quaker  meeting, 
with  imprisonment  at  hard  labour  upon  bread  and  water.1 
Of  this  proclamation  and  law  Governor  Coddington, 
with  grim  humour,  writes  in  his  Postscript : 

"  There  is  come  to  our  Hands  certain  Lawes  or  Orders  of  ye 
3rd  November  1675  set  forth  by  ye  authority  of  your  generall 
Assembly  of  ye  Massachusetts,  your  secretaries  Hand  being  to 
them,  wherein  you  say  you  have  apo stated  from  the  Lord  with  a 
great  backsliding :  To  which  I  do  consent ;  so  great  [as]  hardly 
to  be  paralleled,  all  things  considered.  We  were  a  people 
prfessing  ye  Feare  of  ye  Lord  in  England  against  Bishops  and 
Ceremonies  in  tender  Love  to  all  that  prfessed  Godliness,  and 
so  departed  from  the  land  of  our  Nativity,  declaring  the  Ground 
of  our  Removall  into  N.E.  viz.  to  seek  out  a  Place  for  our 
Brethren  where  we  might  enjoy  the  Liberty  of  our  consciences 
that  ye  sons  of  wickedness  might  vex  us  no  more. 

"  How  well  this  hath  bin  performed  by  you,  let  your  printed 
Lawes  declare  and  this  amongst  the  Rest :  Our  houses  are 
open  to  receive  your  wounded  and  all  in  distress,  we  have 
prpared  a  Hospitall  for  yours,  but  you  a  House  of  Correction  for 
all  that  repaire  to  our  Meetings.  Your  ministers  with  us  have 
not  been  molested,  ours  with  you  have  been  persecuted.  Is 
this  a  time  for  you  to  establish  Iniquity  by  a  Law — will  not  the 
Lord  be  avenged  on  such  a  Nation  as  this  that  sets  up  Ministers 
that  are  not  made  Ministers  by  ye  power  of  an  endless  Life, 
but  of  ye  Letter  that  kills,  and  not  ye  spirit  that  gives  Life,  and 
a  Worship  that  is  not  in  Spirit  and  Truth  set  [up]  by  Christ 
above  1600  yeares  agoe;  we  cannot  come  to  you  without 
departing  from  ye  Lord  as  you  have  done,  therefore  desiring 
your  return  to  ye  Power  that  made  you,  ye  true  Light  that  is  in 
you.  This  is  written  by  one  who  above  45  yeares  past  was  one 
of  you  and  now  is  one  that  desires  your  true  Good  both  Eternall 
and  temporall,  as  I  did  when  I  was  with  you  and  am  yours  in 
Love.— W.  C."  2 

As  a  result  of  the  great  suffering  occasioned  through 
out  the  Colony  of  Rhode  Island  by  the  progress  of  the 

1  Colony  Records  of  Massachusetts,  v.  59. 

2  Easton's  Narrative,  Appendix,  pp.  132-135.     A  still  more  interesting  piece 
of  Coddington  correspondence  is  a  letter  under  date  of  22nd  December  1675, 
from  Governor  Andros  of  New  York,  charging  the  Governor  of  Rhode  Island  with 
having  seized  powder  and  arms  from  a  ship  bound  to  the  port  of  New  York. 
There  is,  unfortunately,  no  answer  extant  to  this  letter,  which  I  give  herewith : 
"  Hon.  Sir, — This  is  by  a  sloop  bound  to  yor  parts  not  to  omitt  noe  good  oppor 
tunity,  though  there  bee  nothing  new,  but  that  I  heare  that  you  stopped  a  vessel 
bound  to  this  place,  on  ace.  of  some  Powder  and  Arnies  in  her,  which  (as  re- 


1 88    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

war — both  Warwick  and  Providence  were  burned  to  the 
ground — the  General  Assembly,  at  its  meeting  in  April 
1676,  roused  itself  to  military  preparation  in  response  to 
the  urgent  calls  of  the  non-insular  inhabitants.  It  was 
voted  that  "  there  appears  absolute  necessity  for  the 
defence  and  safety  of  this  Colony,"  and  that  "  for  the 
orderly  mannagings  of  the  millitia  this  Assembly  doe  agree 
to  chose  a  major  to  be  chiefe  Captaine  of  all  the  Collony 
forces."  John  Cranston  was  chosen  to  be  the  major, 
with  commission  to  use  his  "  utmost  endeavor  to  kill, 
expulse,  expell,  take  and  destroy  all  and  every  the 
enemies  of  this  his  majesty's  collony,"  which  commission 
is  signed  by  Governor  Coddington.1  The  Assembly 
thereupon  sent  John  Easton  and  George  Lawton,  both 
Quakers,  "  with  all  convenient  speed,"  to  Providence  with 
full  power  "  to  determine  whether  a  garrison  or  garrisons 
shall  be  kept  there  at  the  charge  of  the  Colony  and  the 
place  or  places  where  they  shall  be  kept  and  whether  at 
all."  They  decided  on  one  garrison  with  seven  men  and 
a  commander.2 

At  the  summer  election  of  1676,  Walter  Clarke,  in 
spite  of  his  somewhat  halting  "  Quaker  war-policy,"  was 
chosen  Governor,  though  major  John  Cranston  was 
associated  with  him,  as  Deputy-Governor,  to  take  charge 
of  military  affairs.3  The  Colony  was  in  a  sorry  plight 
when  the  new  administration  began.  The  war  was 

presented)  would  not  only  reflect  on  mee  and  the  magistrates  of  this  government 
but  on  his  Royall  Highnesse  and  the  King  himself  whose  commissions  I  have. 
I  cannot  give  creditt  to  this  report,  not  having  heard  from  yorselfe  or  colony  of 
it,  which  I  am  confident  I  should,  yet  being  told  mee  by  sufficient  men  I  pray  I 
may,  etc. — E.  ANDROSS."  Easton's  Narrative,  pp.  130-131. 

1  See  Colony  Records,  ii.  537-539. 

a  Colony  Records,  ii.  545.  The  commander  was  Captain  Fenner,  and  his 
commission  was  signed  by  Walter  Clarke,  the  next  Quaker  Governor. 

3  William  Edmundson,  who  visited  Newport  at  this  time,  says  :  ' '  Great  troubles 
attended  Friends  by  Reason  of  the  war,  which  lay  very  heavy  on  places  belong 
ing  to  that  Quarter  without  the  Island,  the  Indians  killing  and  burning  all  before 
them  ;  and  the  People  who  were  not  Friends  were  outrageous  to  fight ;  but  the 
Governor  being  a  Friend  (one  Walter  Clarke)  could  not  give  commissions  to 
kill  and  destroy  men." — Edmundson's  Journal  (ed.  1715),  p.  82.  At  the  end  of 
the  war  the  Magistrates  of  Plymouth  wrote  to  the  King  their  opinion  of  Quaker 
Governors  in  war  time :  ' '  The  truth  is  the  authority  of  Rhode  Island  being 
all  the  time  of  the  warr  in  the  hands  of  Quakers,  they  scarcely  showed  an  English 
spirit,  either  assisting  us,  their  distressed  neighbors,  or  relieving  their  own  planta 
tions  upon  the  Mayne." — New  England  Papers,  xxxiii.  5. 


CH.  viii        THE  QUAKERS   IN   POLITICS  189 

brought  to  an  end  by  the  mid-summer  of  1676,  when 
Philip  was  hunted  to  his  death  in  the  swamps  by 
Mount  Hope  near  the  scene  of  Easton's  arbitration 
conference,  but  the  non-insular  towns  of  Rhode  Island 
were  almost  wiped  off  the  map.  Every  house  but  one 
between  Providence  and  Stonington  was  destroyed,  and 
most  of  the  territory  outside  the  islands  was  like  a  desert.1 
The  new  Governor  was  fortunately  relieved  from  the 
actual  din  of  war,  but  he  found  himself  loaded  with  many 
problems  which  the  war  had  left  in  its  wake.  One  of  the 
problems  was  the  treatment  of  the  defeated  Indians. 
The  other  Colonies  sold  their  captives  as  slaves.  To 
Rhode  Island  belongs  the  signal  honour  of  having 
inaugurated  a  more  enlightened  policy.  An  Act  of  the 
Assembly  was  passed  that  "  no  Indian  in  this  colony 
be  a  slave."  Some  of  the  leaders  who  were  captured 
were  brought  to  Newport,  and  tried  by  court-martial 
and  shot.  Three  Quakers,  the  Governor,  John  Easton, 
and  Joshua  Coggeshall,  were  members  of  the  court, 
but  apparently  they  did  not  attend  the  session,  owing 
to  their  conscientious  scruples  against  capital  punish 
ment.2 

Governor  Clarke  took  the  first  opportunity  of  peace  to 
discharge  the  garrison  at  Providence,  to  which  he  had 
consented  only  because  of  the  overwhelming  force  of 
popular  demand.  It  was  restored,  however,  by  the 
succeeding  Governor,  Benedict  Arnold,  who  was  a  non- 
Quaker.  About  this  time  a  plague  of  some  sort,  a  very 
deadly  epidemic,  broke  out  and  ravaged  the  Island. 
William  Edmundson,  the  Quaker  traveller,  has  given  us 
our  only  account  of  it.  He  says  : 

1  Drake  says  that  there  was  only  one  house  left  standing  in  Warwick,  three 
in   Providence,  and   none  in   Pawtuxet  (Old  Indian   Chronicle,  p.    244).     The 
scholarly  editor  of  Callender's  Historical  Discourse  thinks  that  the  sufferings  of 
the  Colony  and  the  lack  of  union  in  matters  of  defence  ' '  were  not  owing  only  to 
the  religious  principles  of  the  gentlemen  then  at  the  head  of  our  administration." 
He  points  out  that  there  are  still  in  existence  commissions  signed  and  sealed  by 
the  Quaker  Governor  and  the  Quaker  Deputy-Governor  directing  Benedict  Arnold, 
jun. ,  "to  go  in  an  armed  sloop  to  visit  the  garrisons  at  Providence. "     The 
Deputy-Governor  gave  solemn  evidence  that  he  was  ' '  not  against  giving  com 
missions  that  are  for  the  security  of  the  King's  interests  in  this  colony." — Op.  cit. 
note,  p.  134. 

2  See  Easton's  Narrative,  pp.  173-190. 


190    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

"  Whilst  I  staid  at  Rhode  Island,  the  heat  of  the  Indian  war 
abated,  for  King  Philip,  in  that  war  of  the  Indians,  was  killed 
and  his  party  destroyed  and  subdued.  Presently  a  sickness 
came  which  proved  mortal  and  took  many  away,  few  families 
but  lost  some,  in  two  or  three  days'  sickness.  Many  Friends 
died,  yet  I  constantly  visited  sick  families  of  Friends,  although 
the  smell  of  the  sickness  was  loathsome,  and  many  times  I  could 
feel  all  the  parts  of  my  body  as  it  were  loaden  with  it,  so  that 
I  would  say  to  sick  families,  //  was  much  I  did  not  carry  their 
sickness  away,  I  was  so  loaden  therewith.  After  sometime  it  seized 
upon  me  with  such  violence  that  I  was  forced  to  keep  my  bed 
at  Walter  Newberry's  in  New-Port."1 

In  addition  to  the  problems  of  restoring  the  devastated 
province,  now  swept  also  by  plague,  and  the  problem  of 
the  treatment  of  the  Indians  of  the  Colony,  the  Governor 
had  to  face  again  the  aggressions  of  Connecticut  on  the 
Narragansett  territory.  Three  Rhode  Island  citizens  who 
were  engaged  in  restoring  their  desolate  homesteads  in 
Narragansett  were  seized  by  Connecticut  officers  and 
carried  prisoners  to  Hartford.  Appeal  was  made  to 
Governor  Clarke,  and  he  and  his  council  wrote  immediately, 
demanding  their  release,  and  threatening  reprisal  if  it  was 
refused.2  This  affair,  however,  went  over  to  the  new 
administration,  for  at  the  election  of  1677  the  Quakers 
went  out  of  office  and  the  war-party  triumphed.  One  of 
the  first  acts  of  the  new  Assembly  was  a  Militia  Bill 
which  struck  at  the  provision  for  Quaker  exemption. 
This  Bill  still  insisted  that  there  should  be  "  free  liberty 
of  conscience  for  the  reall  worship  of  God,"  but  it 
declared  that 

"Some  under  pretence  of  conscience  hath  taken  liberty  to 
act  contrary,  and  make  voyde  the  power,  strength,  and  authority 
of  the  millitary  soe  necessary  to  be  upheld  and  maintained,  that 
the  civill  power  (in  which  the  whole  freedome  and  priviledges  of 
his  Majesty's  subjects  are  kept  and  preserved)  cannot  without 
it  be  executed,  and  have  soe  far  acted  therein,  that  this  his 
Majesty's  Collony  at  this  time  is  in  effect  wholly  destitute  of  the 
millitary  forces  for  the  preservation  thereof,  and  inhabitants 

1  Edmundson's  Journal,  p.  82. 

2  Arnold's  History  of  Rhode  Island,  i.  425. 


CH.  vni        THE  QUAKERS   IN   POLITICS  191 

therein,  and  may  thereby  be  made  a  prey  unto  the  weakest  and 
meanest  of  his  Majesty's  enemys." l 

The  Act  proceeds  to  provide  for  an  efficient  militia 
into  which  all  freemen  are  subject  to  draft : 

"Provided,  alwayes,  and  this  Assembly  doe  hereby  declare, 
that  it  is  their  full  and  unanimous  resolution  to  maintaine  a  full 
liberty  in  religious  concernments  relateinge  to  the  worship  of 
God,  and  that  noe  person  in  inhabitinge  within  this  jurisdiction 
shall  bee  in  any  wise  molested,  punished,  disquieted,  or  called  in 
question  for  any  differences  of  opinion  in  matters  of  religion, 
whoe  doe  not  actually  disturbe  the  civill  peace  of  the  Collony." 2 

Benedict  Arnold,  who  had  served  the  Colony  twelve 
times  as  Governor,  and  who  was  generally  chosen  when 
the  Quakers  were  not  in  office,  died  before  his  term  of 
office  expired,  and  William  Coddington,  now  an  old  man, 
was  selected  to  take  the  vacant  place,  but  he  did  not  live 
to  finish  out  the  term,  being  on  his  deathbed  when  the 
Assembly  met,  ist  October  1678,  and  dying  two  days 
later — "  a  good  man,  full  of  days,"  as  Callender  says, 
"  he  died  promoting  the  welfare  and  the  prosperity  of 
the  little  commonwealth  which  he  had  in  a  manner 
founded." 8 

At  the  time  of  his  death  the  Island  colony,  in  which 
he  had  been  the  chief  figure,  was  five  times  as  wealthy  as 
the  other  plantations  in  Rhode  Island,4  and  was  forging 
ahead  with  the  promise  of  becoming  one  of  the  busiest 
ports  on  the  American  coast,  and  one  of  the  leading 
centres  of  wealth  and  culture  in  the  new  world.  The  old 
Governor  had  done  much  to  make  this  development 
possible,  and  Rhode  Island  owes  him  a  large  debt,  even 
though  Judge  Durfee's  epigram  upon  him  is  in  some 
measure  true  :  "  He  had  in  him  a  little  too  much  of  the 
future  for  Massachusetts,  and  a  little  too  much  of  the 
past  for  Rhode  Island." 5 

At  the  next  election,  and  for  five  years  running, 
Walter  Clarke  was  chosen  Deputy-Governor,  and  during 

1  Colony  Records,  ii.  567.  2  Ibid.  p.  571. 

8  Historical  Discourse,  p.  52.  4  Weeden's  Early  Rhode  Island,  p.  97 

5  Judge  Durfee's  Historical  Discourse,  p.  16. 


192    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

this  period  John  Easton,  Caleb  Carr,  Peter  Easton,  and 
Henry  Bull,  all  of  whom  were  Quakers,  were  almost 
continuously  in  public  service  in  one  office  or  another. 
William  Coddington,  son  of  the  old  Governor,  filled  the 
governorship  from  1683  until  just  before  his  death,  which 
occurred  in  1685.  This  period,  from  the  close  of  King 
Philip's  war  to  the  coming  of  Andros — soon  to  be 
described — was  a  time  of  fierce  controversy  for  the 
integrity  of  the  Colony,  as  Connecticut,  Plymouth,  and 
even  New  Hampshire  were  all  laying  claims  to  the 
territory  of  the  mainland  of  Rhode  Island — a  controversy 
too  long  and  complicated  for  this  chapter. 

When  the  junior  Coddington  found  himself  too  ill 
to  accept  office  again — in  1685 — a  fine  old  Quaker 
gentleman,  one  of  the  original  founders  of  Aquidneck, 
Henry  Bull,  was  elected  Governor.1  It  was  plain  to 
everybody  during  this  year  that  stormy  times  for  the 
Colony  were  coming  on,  and  at  the  next  May  election 
Walter  Clarke,  who  had  been  continuously  in  office  for 
many  years,  was  elected  Governor,  and  three  Quakers, 
John  Easton,  Walter  Newberry,  and  Edward  Thurston, 
were  chosen  assistants.  Soon  after  election  the  storm 
broke.  The  Assembly  was  informed  in  June  of  1685,  by 
a  writ  of  quo  warranto  z  "  from  his  gracious  majesty  King 
James  II.,  by  the  hand  of  Edward  Randolph,  Esq., 
secretary  for  the  New  England  colonies,"  that  the  charter 
of  the  Colony  was  "  vacated,"  and  that  Rhode  Island  was 
annexed  to  Massachusetts,  "  under  his  Majesty's  laws  and 
government."  Randolph's  task  in  the  Colonies  had  been 
for  some  years  to  collect  information  which  would  furnish 
adequate  ground  to  annul  the  charters  and  bring  the 
whole  of  New  England  under  the  direct  control  of  the 
Crown,  and  upon  his  so-called  "  information "  the  King 
now  began  to  put  into  operation  his  large  plans  for  an 
extensive  royal  colony. 

1  He  was  one  of  the  sympathizers  with  Anne  Hutchinson,  and  was  "  disarmed  " 
as  a  signer  of  "  the  petition."  He  married  Nicholas  Easton's  widow  Ann.  He, 
too,  like  Coddington,  had  a  famous  house  in  Newport  in  which  meetings  were 
often  held — a  house  which  is  still  standing. 

*  It  was  one  of  the  charges  in  the  quo  warranto  that  the  Governor,  Deputy- 
Governor,  assistants,  deputies,  and  other  officers  were  vnder  no  legal  oaths. 


CH.  vni        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  193 

The  Rhode  Island  Assembly  saw  that  resistance  was 
in  vain,  and  "  voted  not  to  stand  suit  with  his  majesty," 
but  they  prepared  "  a  humble  address,"  asking  that  their 
ancient  privileges  and  liberties  might  be  preserved.1  This 
General  Assembly,  which  was  the  last  one  to  be  held 
until  1690,  made  provision  for  the  separate  towns  of  the 
Colony  to  govern  themselves,  while  the  central  colonial 
administration  was  annuled.  Each  town  was  authorized 
to  hold  an  annual  meeting  of  five  days,  or  longer,  and  to 
manage  all  matters  pertaining  to  the  life  and  prosperity 
of  the  local  civic  community.2 

In  June  1686,  Sir  Edmund  Andros,  formerly  Governor 
of  New  York,  was  commissioned  Governor  of  the  united 
Royal  Colony,  and  almost  upon  entering  upon  his  ad 
ministration,  Andros  wrote,  "  in  his  Majesty's  name," 
demanding  the  surrender  of  the  charter  of  Rhode  Island, 
but  Walter  Clarke  did  not  "  feel  way  open,"  to  send  the 
precious  document  of  their  liberties,  and  it  remained  in 
his  house.  He  and  another  prominent  Friend,  Walter 
Newberry  of  Newport,  were  selected  to  be  members  of 
Governor  Andres's  Council  for  New  England,3  and  they 
attended  the  first  meeting  of  the  Council  in  Boston, 
3Oth  December  1686,  when  they  took  affirmation,  refusing 
to  swear.  Governor  Andros  at  this  time  demanded  the 
delivery  of  the  charter.  The  Rhode  Island  members 
answered  that,  "  'Twas  at  the  Governor's  house  in  Newport, 
and  that  it  should  be  forthcoming  when  sent  for,  but  in 

1  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  iii.  190.     The  Friends  sent  a  special  address  to 
the  King,  in  which  they  "  humbly  prostrated  themselves  before  him,"  and  begged 
that  their  views  in   regard  to  oaths  and  war  might  be  respected.      Printed  in 
British  State  Paper  Office  (New  England),  vol.  iv.  p.  419. 

2  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  iii.  191. 

3  Randolph  wrote  to  the  authorities  in  England,   3151  March  1687  :   "  Our 
council,  consisting  of  twenty-six  persons,  has  in  it  but  three  persons  who  are  of 
the  Church  of  England.     The  rest  are  Quakers,  Anabaptists,  and  either  members 
or  followers  of  the  congregational  churches.     You  may  from  thence  make  your 
estimate  at  what   rate   his   Majestie's   interest  can  be  carried  on." — Randolph 
Correspondence  (Prince  Pub.),  vi.   218.     Walter  Clarke  was  able  to  be  of  con 
siderable  service  on  the  council  to  Friends,  working  particularly  for  the  principle 
of  voluntary  contribution  for  the  support  of  ministry  in  place  of  compulsory  rates. 
See   Randolph   Papers,  ii.    19.     Randolph  himself  wrote   a   vigorous    letter   to 
Governor  Hinckley  of  Plymouth,  calling  him  to  sharp  account  for  the  "arbitrary, 
illegal,  and  unheard  of  "  methods  of  compelling  Quakers  to  support  the  established 
ministry. — Randolph  Correspondence,  iii.  267. 

o 


I94    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

regard  to  [i.e.  on  account  of]  the  tediousness  of  the  bad 
weather  it  could  not  be  brought !  "  l 

Each  request  for  surrender  was  put  off  by  temporising 
methods,  until  finally  Andros  appeared  in  person  with  his 
troops,  returning  from  his  fruitless  charter  "  hunt "  in 
Connecticut,  and  demanded  the  Rhode  Island  charter  then 
and  there.  Walter  Clarke,  its  custodian,  was  ready  for 
him  since  he  had  anticipated  such  a  visit.  The  story  is 
well  told  in  Theodore  Foster's  unpublished  manuscript : 

"  In  the  month  of  November  1687  Sir  Edmund  Andros  came 
to  Newport  from  Hartford  attended  by  his  suite  and  more  than 
sixty  regular  troups  in  order  to  possess  himself  of  the  charter. 
Governor  Clarke,  who  had  it  in  possession,  on  hearing  of  his 
arrival,  sent  it  to  his  brother  with  orders  to  have  it  concealed  in 
some  place  in  the  knowledge  of  his  secretary,  with  instructions 
that  the  Governor  himself  should  not  be  informed  where  it  was. 
Governor  Clarke  then  went  to  wait  on  Sir  E.  Andros  and  invited 
him  to  his  house,  and  so  contrived  the  business  that  though  there 
was  a  great  parade  of  searching  for  it,  it  could  not  be  found 
while  Sir  Edmund  remained  in  Newport.  After  his  departure 
it  was  returned  to  Gov.  Clarke,  who  kept  it,  until  the  reorganisa 
tion  of  the  government  in  1689  when  he  [Clarke]  was  again 
elected  to  the  office  of  Governor.  His  usual  caution  prevented 
him  from  accepting  the  office,  and  induced  him  to  refuse  to 
deliver  up  the  charter  until  after  the  election  of  Henry  Bull,  and 
on  order  of  the  sheriff  to  take  him  into  custody  and  confine  him 
in  prison — on  which  he  sent  the  charter  to  Gov.  Bull."  2 

The  "  fall  "  of  Andros  came  with  the  success  of  the 
English  Revolution,  closing  the  Stuart  regime  and  bringing 
in  William  and  Mary.  When  the  news  reached  Newport 
that  the  government  of  "  usurpation "  was  at  an  end, 
Walter  Clarke  wrote  a  letter  to  the  freemen  of  the  Colony, 
informing  them  that  the  Government  under  which  they 
had  been  "  subservient  is  now  silenced  and  eclipsed,"  and 
calling  them  to  meet  at  Newport  on  the  day  designated 
in  the  precious  charter  for  elections,  "  there  to  consult  and 
agree  on  some  suitable  way  in  this  present  juncture."  3 

1  Proceedings  of  the  American  Antiquarian  Society,  N.S.  xiii.  242. 

8  Foster  Papers  relative  to  the  History  of  Rhode  Island,  i.  337,  in  the 
Providence  Historical  Society. 

3  This  letter,  in  Walter  Clarke's  handwriting,  is  in  vol.  iv.  of  the  Foster 
Papers. 


CH.  vni        THE  QUAKERS   IN   POLITICS  195 

In  accordance  with  this  "  call "  the  freemen  of  the  colony 
met  at  Newport  ist  May  1689,  and  adopted  an  address 
indefinitely,  "  to  the  present  supreme  power  in  England," 
"  being  ignorant,"  they  say,  "  of  what  titles  should  be  given 
and  also  not  so  rhetorical  as  becomes  such  personages."  1 

Andros  had  reported  that  the  "  Quaker  Grandees  of 
Rhode  Island,"  who  had  royally  entertained  him  when  he 
was  Governor  of  New  York,  "had  imbibed  nothing  of 
Quakerism  except  its  indifference  to  forms,"  and  that  they 
cared  nothing  for  the  restoration  of  the  old  government.2 
But  the  outburst  of  joy  which  was  manifested  at  the  fall 
of  Andros  disproved  his  estimate.  The  Newport  Assembly 
declared  their  "  gratitude  to  the  good  Providence  of  God 
which  had  wonderfully  supported  their  predecessors  and 
themselves  through  more  than  ordinary  difficulties  and 
hardships,"  and  they  take  it  to  be  their  duty  "  to  lay  hold 
of  our  former  gracious  privileges,  contained  in  our  charter," 
and  then  by  a  unanimous  vote  the  old  officers  were  con 
firmed.  Walter  Clarke,  with  excessive  Quaker  caution, 
hesitated  to  return  to  the  functions  of  his  interrupted 
office  until  he  knew  what  the  character  of  the  new 
English  government  was  to  be,  and  what  colonial  policy 
it  was  to  adopt.3 

For  ten  months  there  was  no  central  executive  govern 
ment,  the  meeting  of  the  Assembly  called  for  October  by 
Governor  Clarke  having  been  prevented  by  heavy  storms. 
At  the  Assembly  in  February  1690,  Clarke  still  declined 
to  serve  as  chief  magistrate.  Christopher  Almy  was 
elected  and  also  declined.  "  It  was  then,"  as  Bancroft 
says,  "  that  all  eyes  turned  to  one  of  the  old  Antinomian 
exiles,  the  more  than  octogenarian,  Henry  Bull ;  and  the 
fearless  Quaker,  true  to  the  light  within,  employed  the 
last  glimmerings  of  his  life  to  restore  the  democratic 
charter  of  Rhode  Island."  4  Governor  Bull  was  succeeded 
in  office  at  the  end  of  one  term  by  John  Easton,  son  of 

1  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  iii.  268.  2  Ibid.  iii.  339. 

3  Walter  Clarke's  course  at  this  time  is  hard  to  fathom,  though  he  seems  to 
have  had  a  settled  policy  and  the  people  appear  to  have  been  with  him  for  he  was 
soon  again  the  colonial  leader. 

4  History  of  United  States,  ii.  448. 


196    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Governor  Bull's  old  friend,  Nicholas  Easton.  He,  too,  as 
his  father  before  him,  had  had  an  almost  continuous  career 
in  public  office,  and  he  was  trained  in  all  the  intricacies  of 
colonial  affairs.  He  had  been  among  the  leaders  of  the 
colony  in  the  dark  days  of  King  Philip's  war,  and  he  now 
came  to  the  highest  office  in  his  colony  when  another 
serious  war  was  devastating  both  continents — the  French 
and  Indian  War  of  William  and  Mary's  reign.  The 
colonies  were  harried  both  on  the  coast  and  on  their 
inland  borders.  It  was,  oddly  enough,  during  the 
administration  of  this  Quaker  that  the  first  naval  victory 
of  Rhode  Island  was  won.  A  fleet  of  seven  French  ships 
descended  on  the  Narraganset  coast  and  did  much 
damage  to  the  defenceless  shore,  when  suddenly  they  were 
met  by  two  sloops  manned  with  Rhode  Island  freemen 
under  command  of  Captain  Thomas  Paine,  who  furiously 
attacked  the  enemy,  killed  or  wounded  half  their  force, 
and  drove  them  off  to  sea. 

One  of  the  fiercest  contentions  during  Easton's  term 
of  office  was  over  the  control  of  the  militia.  Massachusetts 
and  Plymouth  had  been  united  under  a  royal  Governor, 
Sir  William  Phipps,  whose  commission  gave  him  the 
command  also  of  the  militia  of  Rhode  Island.  This 
commission  was  vigorously  challenged  by  the  authorities 
at  Newport  on  the  ground  that  their  precious  colonial 
charter  gave  them  power  over  their  own  militia.  During 
the  winter  of  1693,  Sir  William  came  in  person  to  Rhode 
Island  and  read  his  commission  to  Governor  Easton. 
When  the  reading  was  over,  the  imperturbable  Quaker 
quietly  replied  that  when  the  Assembly  met,  if  it  had 
anything  further  to  say,  he  would  write.  It  was  not  easy 
to  overawe  such  colonial  governors.  The  question  of  the 
control  of  the  militia  was  fought  out  at  great  length,  the 
colonists  ably  holding  their  position,  until  finally  Queen 
Mary  "  surrendered "  and  wrote  to  Governor  Phipps 
withdrawing  his  control  of  the  Rhode  Island  militia.1  At 
the  same  time  the  Queen  asked  Rhode  Island  to  furnish 

1  The   documents  of  this  controversy  are  printed   in  Rhode   Island  Colony 
Records,  iii.  285-300. 


CH.  vin        THE  QUAKERS   IN  POLITICS  197 

forty-eight  men  to  aid  in  the  defence  and  security  of  the 
colony  of  New  York. 

The  actual  demand  for  these  "  men  "  came  in  a  request 
from  the  Governor  of  New  York  in  the  administration  of 
Caleb  Carr — another  Quaker  politician  of  long  experience 
— who  succeeded  Governor  Easton  in  1695.  Governor 
Carr,  like  all  the  other  Quaker  Governors,  disliked 
extremely  to  get  drawn  into  affairs  beyond  the  home 
field  ;  and  he  was,  too,  conscientiously  opposed  to  adopting 
any  actual  war  measure.  He  urged  that  there  were  great 
difficulties  in  the  way  of  supplying  the  desired  "  men " 
and  asked  of  the  Governor  of  New  York  that  his  colony 
might  furnish  "  some  other  reasonable  assistance  in  com 
putation  of  said  forty-eight  men."  This  request  was 
denied,  and  the  "  men  "  were  demanded  ;  but  again  new 
reason  was  found  why  they  could  not  be  sent  just  then  ! 
Meantime  Governor  Carr  died  in  office  and  the  old 
custodian  of  the  charter,  Walter  Clarke,  came  back  into 
the  governorship,  with  his  old  Quaker  companion,  Walter 
Newberry,  as  an  assistant.  The  ancient  demand  for  troops 
for  New  York  came  up  again  with  increased  urgency. 
Governor  Clarke  replied  that  the  colony  had  no  "  men  "  to 
spare.  "  They  had  themselves,"  he  wrote,  "  forty  miles 
of  sea-coast,  with  three  inlets  and  no  forts,  therefore  all 
the  soldiers  the  colony  possesses  are  too  few  for  our 
defence,  and  furthermore  Massachusetts  has  '  detained ' 
several  of  our  towns,  further  incapacitating  the  colony." l 
The  "  men  "  never  went  to  New  York  ! 

There  is  a  letter  in  the  British  State  Paper  Office, 
signed  by  W.  Clarke,  dated  i/th  September  1702,  which 
declares  that  the  charter  of  Rhode  Island  "  granted  by 
Charles  II.  of  blessed  memory  placed  the  sole  power  of  the 
militia  in  us"  and  the  letter  significantly  adds :  "  We 
conceive  it  our  duty  to  continue  the  militia  as  formerly 
until  we  receive  further  order." 2 

A  new  trouble  now  broke  out  upon  the  colony  of  Rhode 
Island.  There  came  at  this  time  a  radical  change  in  the 


1  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  iii.  316. 
2  Record  office,  C.O.  5.  1302. 


198    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

plan  and  method  in  the  Home  Office  in  London  of 
administering  the  British  Colonies,  and  with  the  change 
came  also  a  thorough  and  searching  investigation  of  the 
internal  affairs  and  procedure  of  the  colonies.  The 
"  investigation "  was  carried  on  under  the  oversight  of 
Edward  Randolph,  who  had  already  become  notorious  in 
the  colonies  as  a  collector  of  "  information."  The  main 
charges  against  the  colony  of  Rhode  Island  were  that  its 
officials  were  not  under  oath,  that  the  laws  of  the  colony 
were  not  published  and  were  badly  kept,  that  the  British 
acts  of  trade  and  navigation  were  disregarded,  and  that 
little  or  no  effort  was  made  to  suppress  piracy — at  that 
time  a  prevailing  evil.1  It  was  even  charged  that  Rhode 
Island  had  become,  through  the  leniency  of  the  Quaker 
rule,  a  nest  for  "  pirates,  smugglers,  and  sea-robbers,"  and 
this  condition  was  attributed  to  "  the  remissness  or  con 
nivance  of  such  as  have  been  or  are  Governors." 2 

Meantime  Jahleel  Brenton,  who  had  gone  to  England 
in  the  interest  of  colonial  affairs,  returned  with  a  com 
mission  to  administer  to  Governor  Clarke  an  oath  of 
obedience  to  the  acts  of  trade,  and  with  a  commission 
also  to  establish  in  Rhode  Island  a  court  of  Admiralty. 
The  Governor,  as  a  Quaker,  would  not  take  any  oath  ; 
and  so  he  refused  to  take  this  oath,  even  though  demanded 
by  his  sovereign.  But  he  went  still  further  in  his  bold 
ness.  He  positively  refused  to  allow  the  court  of 
Admiralty  to  be  established,  because  he  held,  in  the  spirit 
of  the  colonists  of  '76,  that  it  was  an  invasion  of  colonial 
rights? 

Edward  Randolph  gives  this  interesting  glimpse  into 
the  situation,  reporting  his  visit  to  Newport.  He  writes 
that  he  found  all  the  colonists  planting  tobacco,  and  he 
continues : 

"  As  the  governing  power  is  in  the  hands  of  the  Quakers  and 
Anabaptists,  neither  Judges,  Jurys  nor  witnesses  are  under 

1  This  was  the  period  of  Captain  Kidd. 

2  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  iii.  326. 

3  Walter  Clarke,  planting  himself  squarely  on  the  rights  of  the  charter  and 
refusing  to  allow  royal  interference,  is  one  of  the  beginners  of  the  movement 
toward  Independence. 


CH.  vin        THE  QUAKERS  IN   POLITICS  199 

any  [sworn]  obligation,  so  that  all  things  are  managed  ace.  to 
their  will  and  interest  [!].  An  attempt  being  made  by  Mr. 
Brenton  to  erect  a  court  of  Admiralty  under  the  commission  from 
England,  Governor  Walter  Clarke  would  not  allow  it,  telling  the 
assembly ',  then  in  session,  that  it  would  utterly  destroy  their  charter, 
which  empowered  the  colonists  themselves  to  establish  such  a  court 
with  the  proper  officers." *  [The  italics  are  mine.] 

On  this  issue,  actuated  by  the  highest  motives  of 
loyalty  to  the  rights  of  the  colony,  Walter  Clarke  went 
out  of  office,  stubbornly  refusing  to  yield  an  iota  from 
the  rights  of  the  charter  which  he  had  saved  for  the 
colony. 

Samuel  Cranston,  not  a  Quaker,  but  a  nephew  of 
Walter  Clarke,  and  in  hearty  sympathy  with  the  Quaker 
policy,  was  put  in  as  Governor  and  served  continuously 
until  his  death  in  1727,  Walter  Clarke  being  Deputy- 
Governor  with  him  continuously  from  1700  to  his  death  in 
1 7 1 4-2  Randolph's  "  investigations  "  read  very  much  like 
the  partisan  newspaper  investigations  of  the  present  day  ; 
and  one  can  find  here  in  1698  partisan  charges  of  "graft" 
quite  similar  to  those  we  read  to-day.  Randolph 
declares  that  the  Quaker  political  "  machine "  has  for 
a  long  time  been  growing  rich  and  fat  off  its  connivance 
in  piracy !  Two  pirates,  he  says,  were  recently  captured 
in  Newport  and  about  £1500  in  gold  and  silver  taken 
from  them.  They  were  put  in  prison : 

"  But  about  two  days  after  they  were  admitted  to  bail,  by  the 
Governor  (I  am  informed),  one  of  the  Governor's  uncles  being 
their  security.  By  which  means  they  have  opportunity  given 
to  escape,  leaving  their  money  to  be  shared  by  the  Governor  and 
his  two  uncles,  who  have  been  very  great  gainers  by  the  pirates  who 
have  frequented  Rhode  Island.  Walter  Clarke,  the  late  Governor 
and  his  brother  [Weston]  now  the  Recorder  of  the  place,  have 
countenanced  pirates  and  have  enriched  themselves  thereby  [!]."  3 

1  Randolph  Papers  (Prince  Pub.),  ii.  152. 

2  Randolph  informed  the  Home  Office  in  1700  that  Cranston  is  the  present 
Governor  but  theQuakers  have  the  sole  administration  of  the  government.    A  similar 
report  was  made  the  year  before  :   ' '  Mr.  Cranston  was  one  of  the  demi-Quakers 
only  put  in  to  serve  the  Quakers."     See  Palfrey's  History  of  New  England,  iv.  236. 

3  To  the  Board  of  Trade,   soth  May    1698,  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records, 
iii.  339- 


200    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

He  admits,  in  a  postscript,  that  the  two  pirates  are  to 
have  a  trial,  but  he  says  that  he  expects  that  they  will  be 
acquitted.  He  adds  that  he  learns  that  the  people  are 
with  Walter  Clarke  in  his  refusal  to  take  orders  sent  from 
England,  inconsistent  with  their  charter  privileges,  and  he 
understands  that  they  are  raising  money  to  send  Clarke 
to  England  to  represent  the  colonial  case.1 

Here,  with  the  close  of  Walter  Clarke's  career  in  1714, 
ends  the  first  period  of  Quaker  influence  in  the  colony. 
Clarke  had  been  four  times  elected  governor,  and  twenty- 
three  times  deputy-governor,  dying  in  the  office  to  which 
he  had  been  fifteen  times  successively  elected.  From  the 
beginning  of  the  colonial  government  under  the  charter  of 
1663,  Friends  were  continuously  in  office,  of  one  sort  or 
another,  occupying  the  governorship  nineteen  terms  and 
being  a  potent  force  in  the  Assembly.  John  Easton, 
Caleb  Carr,  and  Walter  Clarke  were  among  the  foremost 
spiritual  leaders  of  the  Quaker  society  during  the  period 
of  their  political  activity.  Easton  and  Clarke  were 
ministers  of  the  gospel  and  frequently  went  forth  on 
public  religious  service.  They  were  constantly  involved 
in  issues  of  the  most  complex  and  difficult  sort,  and  they 
seem  through  all  the  shifting  currents  to  have  kept  true 
to  what  they  believed  was  the  path  of  duty  and  at  the 
same  time  to  have  kept  the  confidence  of  the  people. 
They  were  perhaps  not  great  statesmen,  but  they  were 
brave  forerunners  of  the  American  idea  that  the  colonists 
should  govern  themselves,  and  they  deserve  to  be  drawn 
out  of  the  oblivion  into  which  they  have  somewhat  fallen, 
if  for  nothing  else,  for  their  devotion  to  the  principle 
that  gave  birth  to  the  American  nation  and  on  which  its 
political  life  rests  to-day. 

The  second  period  of  Quaker  influence  in  Rhode 
Island  politics  began  with  the  rise  of  the  Wanton  family 
in  the  early  years  of  the  eighteenth  century  and  ended 
with  the  disownment  of  Stephen  Hopkins  in  1774.  It 

1  Brigham,  in  his  Rhode  Island,  p.  160,  declares  that  "actual  complicity 
between  the  colony  as  a  government  and  the  pirates,  as  so  often  charged,  was 
never  shown  by  any  letter  or  report  submitted  to  the  English  authorities." 


CH.  vin        THE  QUAKERS   IN  POLITICS  201 

was  throughout  most  of  this  period  more  an  individual 
influence  than  a  group  influence.  In  1 700  half  the  white 
population  of  Newport  were  Quakers,1  but  as  the  century 
progressed  other  cities  in  the  colony,  especially  Providence, 
rapidly  grew  in  population  and  influence  so  that  the 
Quakers  no  longer  held  their  proportion  to  the  whole 
number  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  colony.  They  continued, 
however,  to  produce  men  of  light  and  leading ;  and  they 
were  yet  for  many  years  to  have  a  large  place  in  the 
administration  of  the  colony  which  they  had  done  much  to 
foster  in  its  formative  period. 

Edward  Wanton  was  one  of  the  foremost  figures  of  the 
New  England  Society  of  Friends  in  its  early  days.  He 
had  been  an  officer  of  guard  in  Boston  on  the  occasion  of 
the  execution  of  the  first  Quaker  martyrs,  and  he  was 
deeply  moved  by  their  innocence  and  heroic  bearing.  He 
came  home  from  the  execution  greatly  changed,  saying 
as  he  unbuckled  his  sword :  "  Mother,  we  have  been 
murdering  the  Lord's  people,  and  I  will  never  put  a  sword 
on  again."  2 

He  thereupon  took  every  opportunity  which  offered  to 
inform  himself  of  the  Quaker  faith,  and  sometime  before 
1 66 1  he  had  openly  avowed  himself  a  Friend.  He  moved 
to  Scituate,  in  Plymouth  colony,  in  1661,  and  started  a 
very  important  venture  in  shipbuilding.  He  was  from 
the  first  the  leading  person  in  the  Quaker  group  of 
Scituate,  and  his  house  was  the  home  of  the  meeting  and 
headquarters  for  all  visiting  Friends,  he  himself  being  the 
foremost  minister  in  that  region.  He  died  in  1716,  as 
the  historian  of  his  town  remarks  : 

"With  faculties  unblurred,  mind  clear,  piety  fervent,  faith 
unwavering  and  active  as  he  nearer  approached  its  realisation, 
from  which  he  could  often  review  his  past  life  and  with  soul- 
stirring  eloquence  and  deep  sympathy  exhort  all  to  stand  fast  in 
the  faith." 

His  oldest  son,  Joseph,  moved  to  Tiverton,  Rhode 
Island,  in  1688,  and  started  there  a  branch  of  the  ship- 

1  Annals  of  Trinity  Church,  p.  10. 
'*  Deane's  History  of  Scituate,  Massachusetts,  p.  372. 


202    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

building  business.  He  was  much  like  his  father  in  large 
ness  of  view,  in  hospitality,  and  in  his  deep  interest  in 
the  Quaker  Society.  Both  he  and  his  wife  (Sarah 
Freeborn)  were  public  ministers,  and  they  entertained  in 
princely  fashion,  being  also  noted  far  and  wide  for  their 
benevolence  and  charity. 

Two  other  sons,  William  (born  in  1670)  and  John 
(born  in  1672),  moved  to  Newport  and  established  there 
a  branch  of  the  shipbuilding  industry  about  1704. 
They  were  men  of  large  business  capacity  and  rapidly 
acquired  great  wealth  for  those  times,  and  soon  came  to 
have  a  very  commanding  part  in  the  colonial  government. 
William  was  not  a  Friend  during  his  public  career,  though 
he  evidently  never  lost  his  love  for  his  father's  faith, 
to  which  he  swung  back  toward  the  end  of  his  life.  He 
broke  away  from  the  Society  of  Friends  in  his  youth  to 
marry  Ruth  Bryant,  whose  parents  were  as  much  opposed 
to  Quakerism  as  William's  family  was  to  Presbyterianism, 
the  creed  in  which  Ruth  had  been  reared.  There  is  a 
tradition  that  William  one  day  said  :  "  Ruth,  let  us  break 
away  from  this  unreasonable  bondage.  I  will  give  up  my 
religion  and  thou  shalt  give  up  thine,  and  we  will  go  to 
the  Church  of  England  and  to  the  devil  together."  •" 

Both  the  brothers  who  came  to  Newport  had  a  military 
strain  in  their  blood,  and  in  the  period  of  youth  they 
performed  dashing  naval  exploits,  chasing  and  capturing 
pirates  and  privateers,  and  taking  an  active  part  in  the 
famous  naval  expedition  of  1709  against  the  French  in 
Canada.2  Two  of  William's  vessels  were  used  for  the 
Canadian  expedition,  and  he  was  on  the  committee  to 
select  officers  for  the  Rhode  Island  ships.  He  was  almost 
continuously  in  some  public  office  between  1704  and  his 
death  in  the  governorship  in  1733,  to  which  he  was  twice 
elected,  having  previously  been  Speaker  of  the  Assembly 
for  seven  years.  A  short  time  before  his  death  he 

1  History  of  Scituate,  p.  374. 

2  There  is  a  current  story  that  the  good  Quaker  father  once  said  :  "It  would  be 
a  great  grief  to  my  spirit  to  hear  that  you  had  fallen  in  a  military  enterprise,  but 
it  would  be  a  greater  grief  to  hear  that  you  were  cowards." — History  of  Scituate, 
P-  374- 


CH.  vm        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  203 

solemnly  remarked :  "  My  father's  God  is  my  God  and  I 
shall  die  in  the  faith  of  the  Quakers." l  The  Wantons 
were  at  the  height  of  their  financial  and  social  position 
when  the  famous  philosopher,  George  Berkeley,  came  to 
Newport  with  large  plans  for  planting  a  great  college  in 
the  New  World,  and  they  frequently  entertained  him. 
"  The  Quakers  with  their  broad-brimmed  hats,  came  and 
stood  in  the  aisles  "  to  hear  him  preach  on  Sundays,2  and 
after  the  Church  service  was  over  the  philosopher  was 
accustomed  to  go  home  to  dine  with  William  Wanton. 

John  swung  back  to  his  father's  faith  much  earlier 
in  life  than  his  elder  brother,  and  from  about  1712  he 
became  a  pronounced  Friend  in  faith  and  practice.  He 
early  developed  a  powerful  gift  in  ministry,  and  devoted 
much  of  his  time  to  religious  service,  preaching  both  in  his 
home  Meeting  at  Newport  and  travelling  far  and  wide  to 
deliver  his  messages  when  he  felt  called  to  go  forth.  His 
biographer  says : 

"  He  was  a  powerful  and  eloquent  preacher.  No  eloquence 
like  his,  it  is  said,  had  been  heard  in  New  England.  Multitudes 
flocked  to  his  preaching  wherever  it  was  known  he  was  to  be 
present.  He  travelled  extensively  in  New  England  and  southerly 
as  far  as  Pennsylvania  in  which  missionary  tours  he  gathered 
multitudes  to  the  Society  of  Friends."3 

He  was  considered  the  wealthiest  man  in  the  colony  ; 
his  manners  were  refined,  and,  though  a  minister  of  the 
Society,  he  wore  "  a  bright  scarlet  cloak  lined  with  blue  ;  " 
his  mind  was  well  cultivated  ;  his  spirit  was  generous  ;  he 
was  very  popular  ;  and  he  had  great  ability  for  public 
service  in  colonial  affairs.  His  political  career  began  in 
1712,  the  year  of  his  positive  affiliation  with  Friends. 
He  was  elected  that  year  a  Deputy  to  the  General 
Assembly  and  successively  until  1721  when  he  was  chosen 
Deputy-Governor.  He  was  continuously  Deputy-Governor 
from  1729  to  1733  when  he  was  elected  Governor  to  fill 
the  place  made  vacant  by  his  brother's  death.  He  served 

1  "  History  of  the  Wanton  Family,"  by  J.  R.  Bartlett,  in  Rhode  Island  Hist. 
Tracts,  No.  3,  p.  33. 

2  Annals  of  Trinity  Church,  p.  10. 

3  Rhode  Island  Hist.  Tracts,  No.  3,  p.  49. 


204    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

the  colony  as  Governor  for  seven  successive  terms,  finally 
dying  in  office  as  his  brother  had  done. 

Like  many  Quaker  Governors  before  him  he  was  called 
upon  to  steer  the  colony  through  a  serious  war — this  time 
the  war  between  Spain  and  the  mother  country  in  which 
the  colonies  were  deeply  involved.1  An  act  was  passed 
by  Rhode  Island  in  1 740  putting  the  colony  in  a  state  of 
defence  and  providing  for  the  enlistment  of  soldiers  to 
serve  in  the  West  Indies.  Governor  Wanton,  now  a 
prominent  Quaker  minister,  was  put  in  a  most  delicate 
and  difficult  situation.  He  was  obliged  as  Governor  to 
issue  military  commissions  and  to  perform  many  duties  of 
a  warlike  nature  which  looked  like  inconsistencies  and 
which  brought  him  under  a  fire  of  criticism  from  the 
authorities  of  the  Quaker  Meeting.  He,  however,  took 
the  course  which  his  predecessors  in  office  had  taken, 
that  as  a  public  officer  his  first  and  clearest  call  was  the 
performance  of  those  duties  which  the  colony  had  laid 
upon  him,  and  on  the  performance  of  which  the  life  and 
welfare  of  the  colony  rested.  He  met  the  committee  of 
Friends  unmoved,  listened  to  their  charge  of  inconsistency, 
and  replied  that  he  clearly  felt  it  right  to  fulfil  his 
obligations  as  the  executive  of  the  colony,  one  of  those 
same  obligations  being  the  protection  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  colony.  "  I  have  endeavoured,"  he  added,  "  on  all 
previous  occasions,  as  on  this,  to  do  my  whole  duty  to 
God  and  to  my  fellow-men,  without  doing  violence  to  the 
law  of  my  conscience,  but  in  all  concerns  listening  to  the 
still  small  voice  of  divine  emanation  and  being  obedient 
to  it."  2 

The  only  other  Quaker  Governor  from  the  Wanton 
family  was  Gideon,  son  of  Joseph  of  Tiverton  and 
grandson  of  Edward  of  Scituate.  Gideon  Wanton  was 
Treasurer  of  Rhode  Island  from  1732  to  1744,  and  he 
was  Governor  of  the  colony  at  the  time  of  the  famous 
expedition  against  Cape  Breton  in  the  war  with  France. 
As  Governor  he  was  called  upon  to  furnish  troops  for  the 

1  War  between  Great  Britain  and  Spain  was  declared  in  1739. 
2  Rhode  Island  Hist.  Tracts,  No.  3,  p.  55. 


CH.  vni        THE  QUAKERS   IN  POLITICS  205 

enterprise,  and  he  complied  with  the  call  as  his  uncles  had 
done  in  similar  straits. 

Another  interesting  character,  whose  colonial  services 
stretched  over  a  period  of  forty  years,  and  whose  influence 
upon  the  destiny  of  the  colony  was  at  times  greater  than 
that  which  a  Governor  could  wield,  was  Richard  Partridge, 
foreign  agent  of  the  colony  in  London.  He  was  the  son 
of  William  Partridge,  who  was  for  several  years  Governor 
of  New  Hampshire,  and  was  born  in  I683,1  probably  in 
the  town  of  Newbury,  where  his  father  was  a  prominent 
member  of  the  Church.  He  moved  to  England  in  his 
early  manhood,  joined  the  Society  of  Friends,  and  was  for 
fifty  years  an  acceptable  and  edifying  minister  of  the 
Gospel,  counting  among  his  personal  friends  the  leaders 
in  the  Quaker  Society  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.2  He 
was  appointed  foreign  agent  for  Rhode  Island  in  June 
1715,  "to  transact,"  as  his  commission  says,  "for  this 
colony  all  its  concerns  beyond  seas,  to  represent  this 
colony  before  the  king  and  council  or  otherwise  as  the 
affairs  of  the  colony  shall  require,  and  he  shall  be  allowed 
for  his  salary  £40  per  annum."  3  He  immediately  proved 
his  fitness  for  the  delicate  diplomatic  tasks  entrusted  to 
him,  for  at  the  autumn  session  of  1715  the  Assembly 
voted  him  its  thanks  for  "  powerfully  exerting  himself  and 
using  his  utmost  efforts  for  excepting  the  colony  of  Rhode 
Island  out  of  the  Bill  of  the  House  of  Commons  for 
regulating  the  charters  of  the  American  colonies."  4  He 
was  always  called  upon  in  times  of  war  to  arrange  the 
quotas  and  contributions  which  Rhode  Island  was  to 
furnish,  and  on  a  number  of  occasions  he  was  asked  to 
act  for  other  colonies  than  Rhode  Island.  His  wisdom 
and  far-sighted  judgment  appear  in  all  his  diplomatic 
undertakings.  The  way  in  which  he  handled  the  veto 
question  of  1731  is  one  interesting  illustration.  The 
Governor  of  Rhode  Island  had  vetoed  an  important  Bill 
and  had  thus  aroused  a  stormy  opposition.  His  right  of 

1  New  England  Historical  and  Genealogical  Register,  xiii.  265. 

2  Thomas  Story  calls  him  "  my  long  acquainted  friend  Richard  Partridge." — 
Journal,  p.  683. 

3  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  iv.  187.  4  Ibid.  iv.  200. 


206    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

veto  was  challenged,  and  he  decided  to  ask  the  officers  of 
the  crown  to  pass  upon  the  rights  of  veto  granted  to  the 
colonial  governor  by  the  charter.  Partridge  at  once  saw 
that  it  would  be  dangerous  for  the  colony  to  raise  this 
question  and  to  call  the  attention  of  the  crown  to  the 
extensive  privileges  granted  in  the  Rhode  Island  charter. 
"  Such  a  course,"  he  wrote,  "  will  prove  of  ill  consequence  to 
the  colony."  l 

Always  on  the  watch  for  what  would  affect  the  rights 
and  privileges  of  his  colony,  he  anticipated  the  danger 
lurking  in  certain  proposed  measures  regulating  trade  in 
the  West  Indies.  He  wrote  to  the  Governor  of  Rhode 
Island : 

"  The  West  India  gentlemen  are  not  quiet ;  they  have  begun  to 
work  through  a  Bill  for  encouraging  trade  with  the  sugar  colonies 
which  will  be  disadvantageous  to  the  Northern  Colonies."  2 

This  refers  to  the  famous  "  Molasses  Act,"  or  "  Sugar 
Act."  The  neighbouring  colonies  were  notified  of  the 
impending  danger,  and  were  asked  to  join  Rhode  Island 
in  opposing  the  Act ;  and  the  entire  case  for  the  northern 
colonies  that  were  especially  affected  was  put  in  Partridge's 
hands.  He  presented  a  vigorous  Petition  to  the  Board  of 
Trade,  in  which  he  claimed  that  the  proposed  Act  involved 
a  violation  of  the  rights  of  the  colonists  as  Englishmen  since 
it  imposed  taxes  on  citizens  who  were  not  represented  in 
Parliament?  This  is  a  direct  announcement  of  the 
principle  which  was  formulated  in  the  Declaration  of 
Independence  and  which  was  fought  out  in  the  Revolu 
tionary  War.  The  opposition  effort  was  not  wholly 
successful,  but  an  unpublished  letter  from  Partridge  says : 
"  By  my  efforts  the  Bill  has  been  made  vastly  different 
from  what  it  was  originally  drawn."  4 

1  Letter  in  Foster  Papers,  ii.    147.      There  is  also  a  valuable  collection  of 
Partridge  Letters  in  the  John  Carter  Brown  Library. 

2  Ibid.  ii.  149. 

3  I  have  searched  the  British  Record  Office  in  vain  for  this  Petition  which  is 
referred  to  in  Arnold's  History  of  Rhode  Island,  ii.    124,  but  I  have  found  a 
letter  from  the  Proprietors  of  Pennsylvania,  undoubtedly  transmitted  by  Partridge, 
which  declares  that  • '  the  proposed  '  Sugar  Act '  takes  from  his  Majesty's  faithful 
subjects  in  North  America  that  liberty  and  freedom  of  commerce  which  is  their 
birthright  yet  unrestrained  !  " — Public  Record  Office  C.O.  5,  No.  13. 

4  This  Letter  is  in  the  Rhode  Island  State  Library. 


CH.  vin        THE  QUAKERS   IN   POLITICS  207 

In  1752  an  order  of  the  King  was  passed  which 
seemed  to  the  Governor  of  Rhode  Island  to  threaten  the 
liberties  of  the  colony.  He  wrote  to  Richard  Partridge  : 

"  Use  all  your  efforts  to  prevent  anything  being  done  to  lessen  our 
charter  privileges.  You  will  understand  how  much  uneasiness 
the  very  thought  of  losing  our  liberties  creates  in  the  inhabitants 
of  this  colony  and  how  much  dependence  they  must  necessarily 
have  on  you,  who  have  been  so  long  their  agent  and  whom  they 
look  upon  by  principle  as  well  as  interest  so  much  a  friend  of 
liberty.  You  will  exert  yourself  to  the  uttermost." x 

One  of  his  difficult  diplomatic  tasks  was  that  of 
securing  from  Great  Britain  financial  compensation  for 
the  colony's  expenses  in  connection  with  the  expedition 
against  Cape  Breton.  He  finally  succeeded  in  getting  an 
appropriation  of  £6  332:12:10,  which  was  precisely 
the  amount  which  the  colony  claimed.  It  was,  however, 
quite  another  matter  to  squeeze  the  actual  money  out  of  the 
Treasury,  but,  to  use  his  own  phrase,  he  "  left  no  stone 
unturned."  It  was  in  appreciation  of  such  unswerving 
fidelity  and  painstaking  effort  that  the  colony  wrote  to 
him  officially  in  1756  : 

"  The  long  experience  the  colony  hath  had  of  your  diligence 
and  faithfulness  in  their  service  leaves  no  room  to  doubt  of  your 
doing  all  in  your  power  in  this  affair  [the  Crown  Point  Expedition] 
for  their  interests,  and  as  you  have  hitherto  been  generally 
successful  in  your  undertakings  on  their  acct.  so  they  hope  you 
will  bring  this  business  to  a  happy  issue  for  you  and  them."  2 

In  1759,  Partridge  was  compelled  by  age  and  feeble 
ness  to  resign  his  position  as  agent,  and  the  same  year 
he  died.3 

No  other  Quaker  in  American  history,  with  the  excep 
tion  of  William  Penn,  has  achieved  such  a  distinguished 
political  career  or  has  contributed  so  much  to  the  develop 
ment  of  our  national  life  as  Stephen  Hopkins  of  Rhode 

1  Rhode  Island  Colony  Records,  v.  359. 

2  Letter  in  Rhode  Island  Historical  Manuscripts,  vi.  23. 

3  Richard  Partridge  was  also  employed  by  the  London  Meeting  for  Sufferings 
as  their  parliamentary  agent,  for  which  service  he  received  £40  annually  and 
expenses.     (See  Minutes  of  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings,  vol.  xxx.  pp.  83,  194,  320 
and  passim. ) 


208    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

Island.  He  was  in  a  true  sense  one  of  the  "  makers  "  of 
the  American  nation.  He  was  born  in  Massapauge,  now 
known  as  South  Providence,  in  March  1 707,  though  his 
early  years  were  passed  in  Chapsumscook  now  Scituate. 
His  mother,  Ruth  Wilkinson,  was  a  birthright  Friend,  a 
woman  of  large  culture  and  of  marked  spiritual  gifts, 
daughter  of  Samuel  Wilkinson  who  was  noted  for  his 
"  erudition  in  divine  and  civil  law,  historical  narrative, 
natural  and  politic."1  In  1726  Stephen  Hopkins  married 
Sarah  Scott,  great-granddaughter  of  Richard  and 
Catherine  Scott,  the  first  Quakers  of  Providence.  His 
bride  was  of  unbroken  Quaker  ancestry,  back  to  these  "  first 
Quakers,"  but  they  were  not  "  married  in  Meeting,"  as 
Stephen  Hopkins  at  this  time  was  not  a  "  member  of  the 
Society."  He,  however, "  joined  Meeting"  about  1755,  near 
the  time  of  his  second  marriage,  which  occurred  in  Quaker 
Meeting  and  was  by  Quaker  ceremony.2  The  Friends' 
Meeting  was  frequently  held  in  Stephen  Hopkins'  home,3 
and  it  is  the  testimony  of  those  who  knew  him  that :  "  In 
the  simplicity  of  his  demeanour,  the  hearty  frankness  and 
calm  dignity  of  manner  which  were  characteristic  of  him, 
he  reflected  no  unworthy  credit  on  the  training  of  his 
Quaker  mother."4 

Like  most  of  the  great  leaders  in  the  formation  of  the 
nation,  Stephen  Hopkins  had  a  long  apprenticeship  in  local 
affairs.  He  first  "  found "  himself  and  his  political 
principles  in  the  colonial  Town-meeting,  being  chosen 
"  moderator "  (i.e.  presiding  officer)  of  the  Town-meeting 
when  he  was  twenty-four.  He  was  continuously  in  township 
service  until  he  was  called  to  higher  colonial  and  federal 
spheres  of  activity.  He  was  still  in  his  youth  when  he 
became  a  citizen  of  Providence  and  in  this  larger  Town- 

1  Updike's   Narragansett  Church,   i.    54.       It  has   been    pointed   out    that 
in  Ruth  Wilkinson's  home  there  was   "a  circulating  library,"  containing  the 
best  literature  available  at  the  time,  one  of  the  earliest  circulating  libraries  in 
Rhode  Island  and  probably  in  the  colonies.      (See  Rhode  Island  Hist.  Tracts, 
No.  19,  pp.  46-47-) 

2  See   Historical   Collection  of  the  Essex  Institute,  ii.    120.      The  Quaker 
marriage  certificate  is  in  the  Roberts  Collection  at  Haverford  College. 

3  See  Letter  of  Moses  Brown  to  Robert  Wain  (1828). 

4  W.  E.  Foster's  "Stephen  Hopkins,  a  Rhode  Island  Statesman"  (in  Rhode 
Island  Hist.  Tracts,  No.  19),  p.  58. 


CH.  vni        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  209 

meeting  he  was  again  and  again — often  in  great  crises — 
chosen  moderator.  He  went  to  the  General  Assembly 
when  he  was  twenty-five,  and  was  a  member  of  this  body 
continuously  for  six  years.  He  had  also  an  important 
judicial  training  and  a  distinguished  career  on  the  Bench, 
rising  to  the  highest  judicial  place  in  the  gift  of  the 
Colony.  He  was  elected  Governor  in  1755,  the  year  he 
became  a  Friend,  and  between  that  date  and  1768  he 
served  in  the  governorship  nine  terms,  through  one  of  the 
stormiest  political  contests  in  the  history  of  Rhode  Island, 
and  he  finally  declined  to  accept  further  nomination  as 
Governor  in  order  to  end  the  political  fight  which  had 
lasted  with  much  heat  for  ten  years,  since  he  saw  the 
importance  of  having  the  Colony  united  for  the  greater 
conflict  which  was  now  coming  into  sight  upon  the 
horizon.  During  these  years  of  judicial  and  political 
activity  he  had,  with  his  lifelong  friend  Moses  Brown, 
been  contributing  his  great  powers  to  the  commercial  and 
intellectual  expansion  of  the  city  of  Providence,  for  it  was 
at  this  period  that  Providence  forged  forward  to  its 
prominent  place  among  the  colonial  cities.  "  He  was," 
as  Chief-Justice  Durfee  has  said,  "  a  man  of  extraordinary 
capacity,  omnivorous  of  knowledge,  which  his  energetic 
mind  rapidly  converted  into  power ;  and  wherever  we  see 
the  colony  or  any  parts  of  its  people  moving  in  ways 
higher  than  the  average,  there  we  are  sure  to  find 
Stephen  Hopkins  prominent  in  the  movement." x 

He  was  first  chosen  for  intercolonial  service  in  1746 
during  the  second  Spanish  War,  when  he  was  selected 
one  of  the  commissioners  from  Rhode  Island  to  meet 
with  those  from  the  other  Colonies  to  consult  for  the 
defence  and  safety  of  the  country.  Again  in  1754 — 
during  the  "  French  and  Indian  War  " — he  was  a  delegate 
to  the  famous  colonial  Congress  held  in  Albany,  at 
which  Franklin  proposed  a  plan  of  union,  and  he  was 
commissioner  in  the  colonial  Congresses  of  1755,  1757, 
and  175^-  He  was  one  of  the  first  to  see  clearly  the 
principle  of  the  unconstitutionality  of  taxation  without 

1  Rhode  Island  Hist.  Tracts,  No.  19,  p.  124. 


210    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  i 

representation.  He  had  reached  his  insight  of  this 
principle  at  least  as  early  as  1756,  as  the  following 
passage,  taken  from  a  deposition  of  Job  Almy  in  a 
lawsuit  between  Stephen  Hopkins  and  Samuel  Ward, 
plainly  indicates  : 

"  I  dined,"  the  deposer  says,  "  at  Mr.  Jonathan  Nicholas', 
Innholder  at  Newport,  March  1756,  where  were  present  Stephen 
Hopkins,  Esq.,  then  Governor  of  this  colony  and  President  of 
the  said  Court  [the  Superior  Court],  Wm.  Richmond,  Esq., 
another  of  the  Justices  of  said  Court,  and  Mr.  John  Aplin,  with 
some  other  gentleman.  And  as  in  conversation  I  was  blaming 
Mr.  Aplin  (who  was  my  attorney)  for  not  insisting  on  the  late 
Act  of  Parliament  wherein  it  is  expressly  declared  that  no  Bills 
of  public  credit  would  be  a  legal  tender  for  any  money  debt,  the 
said  Stephen  Hopkins  with  some  warmth  replied :  '  What  have 
the  King  and  parliament  to  do  with  making  a  law  or  laws  to 
govern  us  any  more  than  the  Mohawks  have?  And  if  the 
Mohawks  should  make  a  law  or  laws  to  govern  us  we  were  as 
much  obliged  to  obey  them  as  any  law  or  laws  the  King  and 
parliament  could  make.'  At  the  same  time  the  said  Stephen 
Hopkins  further  said  that  as  our  forefathers  came  from  Leyden 
[i.e.  the  Pilgrims]  and  were  no  charge  to  England,  the  States  of 
Holland  had  as  good  a  right  to  claim  us  [tax  us  ?  ]  as  England 
had." » 

As  soon  as  news  reached  America  that  Parliament 
was  considering  a  proposition  to  lay  taxes  on  the 
Colonies,  Stephen  Hopkins  began  a  remarkable  series  of 
articles  in  the  Providence  Gazette,  of  which  he  had  been 
one  of  the  founders,  on  the  Rights  of  the  Colonists. 
These  articles  of  his  went  deeper  into  the  foundation 
principles  of  self-government  and  the  true  safeguards  of 
liberty  than  any  documents  which  had  up  to  that  time 
appeared  in  the  colonies.  The  substance  of  these  papers 
was  gathered  up  in  an  important  pamphlet  and  laid 
before  the  General  Assembly  of  Rhode  Island  in  1764,  a 
year  before  the  Stamp  Act  was  passed,  and  this  document 
was  put  into  general  circulation,  and  was  very  widely  read 
throughout  the  Colonies,  and  became  one  of  the  creative 
documents  in  shaping  the  course  of  American  history. 

1  The  Law  Reporter  for  1859,  vol.  xxii.  p.  338. 


CH.  viii        THE  QUAKERS  IN  POLITICS  211 

Already,  in  this  early  paper,  Stephen  Hopkins  taught  the 
colonists  to  think  in  terms  of  country. 

As  soon  as  news  of  the  actual  passage  of  these  Acts  of 
colonial  taxation  reached  Rhode  Island,  Governor  Hopkins 
called  a  special  session  of  the  General  Assembly,  and  he 
was  the  leader  in  the  great  Town-meeting  of  Providence 
which  formulated  a  draft  of  instructions  to  the  General 
Assembly.1  It  even  surpassed  in  boldness  the  resolutions 
adopted  by  the  House  of  Burgesses  of  Virginia  under 
the  eloquence  of  Patrick  Henry,  and  it  ended  with  the 
downright  assertion : 

"The  inhabitants  of  this  colony  are  not  bound  to  yield 
obedience  to  any  law  or  ordinance  designed  to  impose  any 
internal  taxation  whatever  upon  them  other  than  the  laws  and 
ordinances  of  the  General  Assembly."  2 

Parliament,  under  the  storm  of  opposition,  repealed 
the  Stamp  Act,  but  asserted  its  right  to  tax  the  Colonies, 
and  emphasized  the  right  by  the  imposition  of  a  tax  on 
certain  imports.  A  Town-meeting  was  called  in  Provi 
dence  to  propose  a  plan  for  avoiding  this  tax.  A 
committee,  of  which  Stephen  Hopkins  was  a  member, 
drew  up  a  resolution  that  only  home-produced  articles 
should  be  used  while  this  tax  was  in  force.  These 
resolutions  are  in  the  handwriting  of  Moses  Brown.3  As 
the  storm  of  hostility  against  the  mistaken  course  of  the 
mother-country  grew  in  violence,  Rhode  Island,  always  a 
liberty-loving  Colony,  became  one  of  the  most  intense 
storm  centres  of  opposition.  It  was  from  the  city  of 
Providence  that  the  party  of  "  patriots  "  headed  by  John 
Brown,  the  brother  of  Moses  Brown,  sallied  out  and 
burned  the  King's  ship  GaspJe,  stationed  in  the  Bay  to 
enforce  the  revenue  acts  ;  and  as  the  storm  gathered  still 
darker,  it  was  the  Town-meeting  of  Providence,  in  which 
Stephen  Hopkins  was  the  foremost  person,  that  made  the 
first  formal  and  official  proposal  for  a  Continental 
Congress,  and  Rhode  Island  was  the  first  Colony  to  elect 
delegates  to  that  congress,  Stephen  Hopkins  being  one  of 

1  Hopkins  was  chairman  of  the  committee  which  formulated  this  document. 

2  Staples'  Annals  of  Providence,  pp.  210-213.  3  Ibid.  p.  217. 


212    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  i 

the  delegates.1  In  1776,  with  trembling  hand,  trembling 
not  from  fear  but  from  advancing  palsy,  he  signed  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  toward  which  he  had  been 
for  more  than  a  decade  steadily  moving  and  leading  the 
people.2 

This  chapter  of  Quaker  political  history  is  far  from  a 
complete  account  of  the  part  which  the  Quakers  took  in 
the  colonial  politics  of  Rhode  Island.  It  has  dealt  only 
with  the  leaders ;  but  the  unnamed  people  behind  the 
leaders  are  always  at  least  as  important  a  factor  as  the 
leaders  themselves,  and  there  was  always  a  large  group 
of  Quakers  around  each  Quaker  leader.  This  deeper 
history  of  the  people  themselves  cannot  be  written.  This 
chapter,  furthermore,  of  necessity  has  treated  the  Quaker 
factor  quite  too  much  in  isolation.  The  Quakers  were 
not  a  class  apart — a  peculiar  order  of  humanity.  They 
were  simply  men  like  other  men,  sometimes  peculiarly 
dressed  and  using  somewhat  odd  speech,  but  a  part  of  a 
larger  whole  and  owing  much  of  their  political  success  to 
the  non-Quaker  element  with  which  they  worked.  They 
had  then,  as  we  have  now,  narrowness,  greed,  corruption, 
and  misrepresentation  to  face.  Conditions  were  no  more 
angelic  then  than  in  the  present  year  of  grace,  and  these 
adherents  of  the  inward  Light  were  throughout  their 
political  career  on  the  "  perilous  edge."  Every  issue  had 
its  practical  complications,  its  mean  aspects.  No  claim  is 
here  made  that  these  "  heroes "  were  always  wise,  or 
always  right,  or  always  great,  but  they  are  a  fair 
illustration  of  our  best  common  people,  doing  their  duties 
with  fearless  spirit,  uniting  religion  with  practical  daily 
life,  exhibiting  loyalty  in  the  hard  field  of  politics,  and 
never  bartering  for  selfish  ends  "  the  priceless  jewel  of 
their  soul." 

1  When  the  order  came  to  arrest  the  "patriots"  who  burned  the  Gaspie 
and  send  them  to  England  for  trial  Stephen  Hopkins,  then  Chief-Justice  of  the 
colony,  said  :  "  I  will  neither  apprehend  any  person  by  my  own  order,  nor  suffer 
any  executive  officers  in  the  colony  to  do  it." — Weeden,  Early  Rhode  Island, 

P.  336- 

*  He  was,  however,  at  the  time  of  signing  the  Declaration  no  longer  a  member 
of  Meeting  for  reasons  given  in  the  preceding  chapter. 


BOOK   II 

QUAKERISM    IN    THE    COLONY   OF 
NEW  YORK 


2*3 


CHAPTER    I 

THE    PLANTING    OF   QUAKERISM    IN    NEW   YORK 

"  NEW  YORK  "  was  a  part  of  the  Dutch  Colony  of  New 
Netherlands  when  the  Quaker  "  invasion  "  of  the  Colonies 
began.  The  Dutch  had  passed  through  their  baptism  of 
fire  in  one  of  the  most  heroic  struggles  in  history,  and 
had,  at  great  cost,  won  their  religious  freedom.  They 
had  before  most  peoples  gained  the  tolerant  attitude. 
They  had  furnished,  in  their  home-land,  an  asylum  to  the 
harried  English  Separatists ;  and  they  had  long  been 
accustomed  to  the  "  lay-type "  of  Christianity,  embodied 
in  the  Mennonite  Anabaptists,  who  had,  before  George 
Fox,  advanced  many  of  the  ideas  and  peculiarities  of  the 
Quakers.  The  Proprietaries  of  New  Netherlands  had 
expressly  directed  that  all  forms  of  religion  should  be 
tolerated  in  the  Colony.1  It  would  have  been  a  natural 
prediction,  therefore,  that  Quakerism  would  flourish 
undisturbed  in  the  Dutch  Colony,  but  on  the  contrary  it 
spread  here,  as  in  the  Puritan  Colonies,  only  in  the  face  of 
stern  opposition. 

Long  Island,  however,  presented  a  prepared  soil  for 
the  new  religious  seed,  something  like  that  which  we  have 
seen  in  Rhode  Island,  Sandwich,  and  on  the  island  of 
Nantucket.  Though  under  the  Dutch  Government,  many 
of  the  towns  on  the  island  were  settled  by  English 
colonists,  a  large  number  of  them  being  persons  who  had 
left  Massachusetts  in  order  to  secure  greater  religious 

1  The  settlers  of  Maspeth  (Newtown)  on  Long  Island,  to  cite  a  particular 
instance,  were  induced  to  come  to  the  Dutch  territory  on  the  promise  of  civil 
and  religious  freedom. — Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  138. 

215 


216    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  n 

freedom.  We  have  seen  how  the  religious  teaching  of 
Anne  Hutchinson  prepared  the  way  for  the  spread  of 
Quakerism  on  Rhode  Island  and  at  other  places  in  New 
England  ;  so,  too,  it  was  in  large  measure  due  to  the 
religious  influence  and  leadership  of  another  woman  that 
the  towns  of  Long  Island  were  prepared  for  the  Quaker 
message  which  came  to  them  in  1657.  This  woman 
was  Lady  Deborah  Moody. 

Her  maiden  name  was  Deborah  Dunch,  and  she 
belonged  to  a  distinguished  family,  her  father,  Walter 
Dunch,  having  rendered  good  service  to  his  country  in  the 
reign  of  Elizabeth.  She  married  Sir  Henry  Moody  of 
Garesden  in  Wiltshire,  but  was  left  a  widow  in  early  life. 
She  showed,  even  in  her  English  period,  great  independ 
ence  of  mind  and  a  determination  to  follow  fearlessly 
her  own  light.  This  independent  spirit  soon  brought  her 
into  collision  with  the  Court  of  the  Star-Chamber  ;  and 
being  an  intimate  friend  of  the  Winthrops,  she  resolved  to 
migrate  to  Massachusetts  to  secure  the  freedom  which 
she  despaired  of  gaining  at  home.  She  settled  in  Lynn 
about  1640  and  purchased  an  extensive  estate  called 
"  Swampscot," l  but  was  hardly  settled  there  on  her 
beautiful  cliff  farm  before  her  liberal  views  brought  her 
into  trouble  with  the  Salem  Church.  The  Court  pro 
ceedings,  under  date  of  December  1642,  report  that 
"  Lady  Deborah  Moody,  Mrs.  King,  and  the  wife  of  John 
Tillton  were  presented  for  houldinge  that  the  baptising  of 
Infants  is  noe  ordinance  of  God,"2  in  other  words  a 
group  of  Anabaptists  was  forming  in  Lynn  with  Lady 
Moody  as  its  spiritual  leader.  Winthrop  gives  an  in 
teresting  glimpse  of  her  "  heresy  "  : 

"  The  Lady  Moodye,  a  wise  and  anciently  religious  woman, 
being  taken  with  the  error  of  denying  baptism  to  infants  was 
dealt  with  by  many  of  the  elders  and  others,  but  persisting  still 
and  to  avoid  further  trouble,  etc.,  she  removed  to  the  Dutch 
against  the  advice  of  all  her  friends.  Many  others,  infected 

1  Letchford,  in  1641,  says  :   "  Lady  Moody  lives  at  Lynn  but  is  of  the  Salem 
Church.     She  is  a  good  lady  but  almost  undone  by  buying  Master  Humphries' 
farm  Swampscot." 

2  Newhall's  History  of  Lynn  (Boston,  1865),  p.  204. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  217 

with    anabaptism,    removed   thither  also.      She  was   after  ex 
communicated."  1 

As  Winthrop  intimates,  she  refused  to  accept  the 
offered  theological  direction,  insisted  upon  her  right  to 
live  in  the  faith  which  seemed  to  her  true,  and  once  more 
migrated  to  secure  the  privilege  of  freedom.  She  moved 
to  Long  Island  and  purchased  a  large  estate  at  Gravesend, 
and  with  her  migrated  also  a  large  number  of  the  Lynn 
settlers,  "  infected,"  as  Winthrop  says,  "  with  Anabaptism." 
A  Petition  to  the  General  Court  in  1645  refers  to  this 
migration  as  follows  : 

"  Those  fewe  able  persons  which  were  with  and  of  us  it's  not 
unknowne  how  many  of  them  have  deserted  us,  as  my  Lady 
Moody."2 

Three  years  before  Lady  Moody's  pilgrimage  to 
Gravesend,  forty  families  from  Lynn  had  planted  a  Colony 
on  Long  Island  with  large  guarantees  of  freedom  and 
with  the  design  to  build  up  there  a  Church  "  gathered  and 
constituted  according  to  the  minde  of  Christ,  for,"  they 
say,  "  wee  do  ffreely  lay  down  our  power  at  the  ffeete  of 
Christ," 3  and  throughout  this  decade  there  were  frequent 
migrations  from  Lynn  to  the  Long  Island  towns,  so  that 
in  Flushing,  Gravesend,  Jamaica,  Hempstead,  and  Oyster 
Bay  there  were  many  persons  who  had  deserted  Lynn  to 
find  religious  freedom,  and  who  shared  with  Lady  Moody 
the  advanced  and  liberal  ideas  which  in  that  generation 
were  gathered  up  under  the  name  of  "  Anabaptism."  A 
characteristic  entry  in  the  Massachusetts  Records  for 
1643  says  : 

"  Rev.  Mr.  Walton  of  Marblehead  is  for  Long  Island  shortly, 
there  to  set  down  with  my  lady  Moody,  from  under  civill  and 
church  ward,  among  ye  Dutch." 

The  ecclesiastical  records  of  New  Amsterdam  make 
the  fact  very  plain  that  many  of  the  English  inhabitants 
of  these  Long  Island  towns  were  not  kindly  disposed 
toward  the  prevailing  orthodox  Calvinism,  but  on  the 

1  Winthrop's  History  of  New  England,  ii.  148. 
2  History  of  Lynn,  p.  214.  . 8  Ibid.  p.  194. 


218    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

contrary  were  either  of  the  Anabaptist  or  of  the  Seeker 
type.  In  1653  the  Director-General  of  the  Colony  com 
plained  that  magistrates  on  Long  Island  were  being 
selected  without  regard  to  their  religion,  and  especially, 
he  says,  "the  people  of  Gravesend  who  elect  libertines 
[free-thinkers]  and  anabaptists."1  Three  years  later 
William  Hallett  was  banished  from  the  Province  of  New 
Netherlands  for  allowing  conventicles  and  gatherings 
in  his  house  at  Flushing,  and  William  Wickendam,  a 
cobbler  by  trade,  was  also  banished  for  having  taken  the 
leading  part  in  these  house  meetings,  which  seem  to  have 
been  meetings  for  worship  after  the  manner  of  the  small 
dissenting  sects.2  In  1657,  the  year  the  Quakers  arrived 
on  Long  Island,  two  of  the  leading  Dutch  ministers  in 
the  Colony,  Joannes  Megapolensis  and  Samuel  Drisius, 
both  keen  in  the  scent  of  heresy,  wrote  to  the  Classis  of 
Amsterdam  a  full  account  of  the  religious  condition  in 
New  Amsterdam.  They  reported  the  people  at  Gravesend 
to  be  Anabaptists  of  the  Mennonite  type.  "  The  majority 
of  them,"  they  say,  "  reject  the  baptism  of  infants,  the 
observance  of  the  Sabbath,  the  office  of  preacher,  any 
teachers  of  God's  word.  They  say  that  thereby  all  sorts 
of  contentions  have  come  into  the  world.  Whenever 
they  meet,  one  or  the  other  reads  something  to  them." 
"  At  Flushing,"  the  report  says,  "  many  persons  have 
become  imbued  with  divers  opinions.  They  absented 
themselves  from  the  sermon  and  would  not  pay  the 
preacher  [Francis  Doughty]  his  salary.8  Last  year  a 
troublesome  fellow,  a  cobbler  from  Rhode  Island  came 
there  saying  he  had  a  commission  from  Christ "  [evidently 
William  Wickendam].  At  Middleburg,  a  part  of  Newtown, 
the  people  are  said  to  be  mostly  Independents  who  have 
an  unordained  preacher  "  who  does  not  serve  the  sacra 
ments."  At  Hempstead  "the  people  listen  attentively 
to  the  sermons  of  Richard  Denton,  a  pious,  godly,  and 

1  Colonial  Documents  of  New  York,  xiv.  235. 

2  Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  361-362. 

8  The  salary  of  Francis  Doughty  was  to  have  been  six  hundred  guilders,  but  it 
was  never  paid ;  and  it  was  found,  when  the  minister  sued  for  his  salary,  that 
Wm.  Lawrence's  wife  had  destroyed  the  contract  by  "  putting  it  under  a  pye." 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN  NEW  YORK  219 

learned  man,"  but  when  he  began  to  baptize  children, 
"  many  persons  rushed  out  of  the  church  !  "  1  Such,  then, 
was  the  spiritual  condition  of  the  Long  Island  towns  when 
the  first  messengers  of  Quakerism  came  thither  to  make 
convincements.  There  was  already  in  existence  here  a 
type  of  religion  which  was  independent  of  ordained 
ministers,  which  regarded  the  sacraments  as  unnecessary 
and  which  welcomed  the  common  man  who  came  with  a 
direct  commission.  They  were  by  the  bent  of  their  minds 
open  to  the  word  of  the  preachers  of  the  inward  Light. 
In  fact,  one  Quaker  seems  to  have  been  raised  out  of  their 
own  group  even  before  any  messengers  came.  This  was 
Richard  Smith.  He  had  been  to  England  on  a  visit  in 
1654,  had  apparently  come  under  the  influence  of  William 
Dewsbury,2  and  had  returned  a  convinced  Friend,  so 
that  he  was  the  first  Quaker  in  the  American  colonies. 
When  the  eight  Friends  came  out  from  England  in  1656 
on  their  missionary  journey  to  New  England,  they  halted 
either  at  New  Amsterdam  or  on  Long  Island  and  picked 
up  this  Richard  Smith  on  their  way  and  took  him  with 
them  on  their  bold  venture.  He  was  hurried  back  to 
Long  Island  by  ship  that  he  might  not  contaminate  or 
infect  any  body  by  a  land  journey  ! 3 

"  The  spiritual  Argonauts "  who  came  in  the  ship 
Woodhouse,  with  Captain  Fowler  in  1657,  were  the  first 
Quakers  known  to  have  landed  in  New  Amsterdam,  now 
New  York  city.  Five  of  the  eleven,  Robert  Hodgson, 

1  Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  393-399. 

8  Francis  Ellington's  Tract,  A  True  Discovery  (London,  1655). 

*  This  was  Richard  Smith  of  Southampton,  Long  Island,  and  not,  as  Bowden 
(vol.  i.  p.  310)  assumes,  the  famous  trader  of  that  name  who  in  1641  "erected 
a  house  of  trade  and  entertainment "  in  the  Narragansett  country.  This  latter 
Richard  Smith  never  became  a  Friend.  He  settled  at  Maspeth,  on  Long  Island, 
about  1645  and  remained  there  a  few  years  (see  Riker's  Annals  of  Newtown),  but 
he  was  back  in  Narragansett  by  1649.  The  Records  of  Southampton  for  October 
1656  furnish  one  piece  of  information  about  Richard  Smith  the  Quaker  :  "  It  is 
ordered  by  the  General  Court  that  Richard  Smith,  for  his  unreverend  carriage 
toward  the  magistrates  contrary  to  the  order,  was  adjudged  to  be  banished  out  of 
the  town,  and  he  is  to  have  a  week's  liberty  to  prepare  himself  to  depart ;  and  if 
at  any  time  he  be  found  after  this  limited  week  within  the  bounds  of  the  town  he 
shall  forfeit  twenty  shillings.  It  is  ordered  by  the  General  Court  that  Richard 
Smith  for  his  unreverend  carriage  to  the  magistrate  was  judged  to  pay  the  sum  of 
5  pounds  to  be  levied  immediately  upon  the  goods  and  chattels  of  the  said  Richard 
Smith."  He  is  in  the  same  Records  called  "an  emissary  of  Sathan,  a  Quaker." 


220    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

Richard  Doudney,  Mary  Wetherhead,  Dorothy  Waugh, 
and  Sarah  Gibbons,  stopped  in  the  Dutch  Colony  while 
the  rest  went  on  to  Rhode  Island.  Captain  Fowler,  before 
the  Woodhouse  left  the  port  of  New  Amsterdam,  with 
Robert  Hodgson,  paid  a  visit  to  Governor  Stuyvesant  and 
found  him  "  moderate  both  in  words  and  actions."  His 
"  moderation "  was,  however,  soon  changed.  The  next 
day  Mary  Wetherhead  and  Dorothy  Waugh  preached  to 
the  people  in  the  streets  of  New  Amsterdam,  and  the 
effect  of  this  novel  sight  upon  the  Dutch  inhabitants  was 
instantaneous  and  pronounced.  They  had  no  desire  to 
see  their  womenfolk  catch  this  odd  custom  of  preaching 
in  the  streets,  and  they  soon  had  the  two  women  in  "  a 
noisome,  filthy  dungeon  " — a  more  than  usually  vile  jail 
even  for  the  seventeenth  century ;  and  after  eight  days 
they  brought  them  out  of  the  dark  hole,  and  sent  them 
with  their  hands  tied  behind  them  to  that  "  sewer  of 
heretics,"  Rhode  Island,  to  join  their  companions. 

The  two  ministers  already  quoted,  Joannes  Megapolensis 
and  Samuel  Drisius,  wrote  to  the  authorities  in  Amsterdam 
an  interesting  account,  though  considerably  coloured,  of 
this  invasion  : 

"On  August  6th  (or  izth)  a  ship  came  from  the  sea  to  this 
place,  having  no  flag  flying  from  the  topmast,  nor  from  any 
other  part  of  the  ship.  .  .  .  They  fired  no  salute  before  the  fort. 
When  the  master  of  the  ship  came  on  shore  and  appeared 
before  the  Director-General,  he  rendered  him  no  respect,  but 
stood  with  his  hat  firm  on  his  head  as  if  a  goat  (!).  ...  At  last 
information  was  gained  that  it  was  a  ship  with  Quakers  on  board. 
.  .  .  We  suppose  they  went  to  Rhode  Island  for  that  is  the 
receptacle  of  all  sorts  of  riff-raff  people  and  is  nothing  else  than 
the  sewer  of  New  England.  They  left  behind  two  strong  young 
women.  As  soon  as  the  ship  had  departed,  these  [women] 
began  to  quake  and  go  into  a  frenzy,  and  cry  out  loudly  in  the 
middle  of  the  street  that  men  should  repent,  for  the  day  of 
judgment  was  at  hand.  Our  people  not  knowing  what  was  the 
matter  ran  to  and  fro  while  one  cried  '  fire '  and  another  some 
thing  else.  The  Fiscal  seized  them  both  by  the  head  and  led 
them  to  prison."  x 

1  Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  399. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  221 

The  other  three  members  of  the  party  who  remained 
behind  made  a  tour  of  Long  Island,  where  they  found 
many  hearts  ready  for  their  message,  especially  in  the 
towns  of  Gravesend,  Jamaica,  and  Hempstead.  Hodgson 
concluded  to  stay  in  Hempstead  for  a  larger  service,  while 
his  two  companions  went  on  through  the  island  and  across 
to  Rhode  Island,  and  upon  him  fell  a  baptism  of  persecu 
tion  of  a  peculiarly  furious  sort.  Hodgson  had  invited  the 
inhabitants  of  Hempstead  to  a  meeting  in  an  orchard  on 
a  certain  "  First-day,"  and  as  he  was  pacing  back  and 
forth  in  quiet  meditation  among  the  trees  of  the  orchard 
waiting  for  meeting  to  begin,  he  was  "  violently  seized  " 
by  a  local  magistrate  named  Richard  Gildersleeve  who 
took  him  as  a  prisoner  to  his  own  house.  The  officer 
left  his  prisoner  and  went  to  the  morning  religious  service. 
When  he  returned  he  found  a  company  gathered  and 
Hodgson  preaching  to  them  !  He  was  thereupon  moved 
to  the  house  of  a  magistrate  and  still  the  people  came 
"  to  hear  truth."  Word  was  now  sent  to  Governor 
Stuyvesant,  who  despatched  a  sheriff  and  jailer  with  a 
guard  of  twelve  musketeers  to  bring  the  prisoner  to  New 
Amsterdam.  They  pinioned  Hodgson  and  left  him 
closely  bound  for  a  whole  day  while  they  hunted  out  the 
persons  who  had  entertained  him.  Two  women  were 
finally  arrested  on  this  charge,  one  of  whom  had  two 
small  children — one  a  babe  still  on  the  breast.  They 
were  placed  in  a  cart,  to  the  tail  of  which  Hodgson  was 
tied,  and  thus  they  journeyed  through  an  entire  night 
to  Brooklyn  ferry,  and  so  across  to  New  Amsterdam.1 
The  women  were  soon  set  free,  but  Robert  Hodgson  was 
sentenced  to  a  fine  of  a  hundred  guilders,  or  hard  labour 
at  a  wheelbarrow  with  a  negro  for  two  years,  "  in  order  to 
suppress  the  evil  in  the  beginning."  As  Friends  always 
did  do,  he  refused  to  pay  the  fine.  He  was  brought  out 
and  chained  to  the  wheelbarrow,  but  feeling  himself 
innocent  of  any  violation  of  law,  he  refused  to  work. 

1  There  is  a  Dutch  account  of  Hodgson's  arrest  and  punishment  preserved  in 
Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  410.  This  account  gives  the  distance 
Hodgson  was  carried  as  twenty-one  English  miles. 


222    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

He  was  thereupon  beaten  almost  to  death  with  a  tarred 
rope,  then  chained  to  the  barrow,  and  left  in  the  hot  sun 
all  day.  The  next  day  he  was  again  brought  out,  chained 
to  the  barrow,  and  ordered  by  the  Governor  in  person  to 
work.  Proving  unyielding,  he  was  next  tied  up  by  the 
hands  with  a  heavy  log  of  wood  hung  on  his  ankles  and 
whipped  on  his  bare  back,  and  then  thrust  into  a  dungeon 
"  too  bad  for  swine."  As  news  of  his  sufferings  got 
abroad,  a  humane  Englishwoman  got  into  the  prison  to 
see  him,  washed  his  stripes,  and  told  her  husband  of  his 
desperate  condition.  The  husband  offered  the  officer  in 
charge  one  of  his  oxen  if  he  would  release  the  Quaker. 
Others  also  came  forward  and  offered  to  pay  the  fine. 
Hodgson  declined  to  accept  liberation  on  this  principle, 
as  he  was  innocent  His  sufferings,  however,  made  such 
a  deep  impression  on  the  liberty-loving  Dutch  people 
that  powerful  influences  were  brought  to  bear  on  the 
Governor,  who  finally  set  him  free  without  any  payment  at 
all,  and  Hodgson  passed  on  to  join  his  friends  in  Rhode 
Island.1 

This  brief  and  hampered  presentation  of  Quakerism 
on  Long  Island  was  remarkably  effective,  and  resulted  in 
the  rapid  formation  of  Quaker  groups.  The  people  were 
in  an  expectant  state,  with  spirits  prepared  for  the  new 
message  and  the  new  manner  of  life,  and  they  accepted 
the  Quaker  faith  almost  by  whole  communities.  If  we 
may  trust  Gerard  Croese,  an  inaccurate  though  con 
temporary  Dutch  historian,  Lady  Moody  almost  at  once 
became  a  Friend.  "  There  was  at  Gravesend,"  he  says, 
"  a  noble  lady,  the  countess  of  Mordee  who  turned 
Quaker."  "  She  gave  the  people  of  this  Society,"  he 
continues,  "  the  liberty  of  meeting  in  her  house,  but  she 
managed  it  with  such  prudence  and  observance  of  time 
and  place  that  she  gave  no  offense  to  any  stranger  or 
person  of  any  other  religion  than  her  own,  and  so  she 
and  her  people  remained  free  from  all  molestation  and 

1  The  accounts  of  this  episode  are  found  in  Bishop's  New  England  Judged, 
p.  213  ;  Sewel's  History,  \.  398 ;  Bowden's  History,  i.  312  ;  Brodhead's  History 
of  New  York,  i.  636. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  223 

disturbance."  l  The  first  convincements  were  made  almost 
entirely  among  her  friends  and  sympathisers.  The  Tiltons, 
the  Townsends,  the  Farringtons,  the  Thornes,  the  Feakes, 
and  a  number  of  other  families  had  probably  been  her 
associates  in  Lynn  and  had  come  to  Long  Island  at  the 
time  of  her  migration.  As  soon  as  persecution  came 
upon  the  new  movement  the  first  local  heroes  came  out 
of  this  prepared  group.  Governor  Stuyvesant  was  the 
instrument  of  this  early  persecution,  but,  as  nearly  all 
the  authorities  imply,  he  was  urged  and  almost  pushed 
to  it  by  influence  from  Massachusetts.  When  once  he 
had  undertaken  the  course  of  suppressing  the  invading 
"  heresy,"  he  pursued  it  with  the  tenacity  native  to  his 
race  and  disposition.  The  first  step  against  the  move 
ment  was  the  proclamation  of  a  law  imposing  a  fine  of 
fifty  pounds  upon  any  colonist  who  entertained  a  Quaker 
even  for  one  night,  and  providing  for  the  confiscation  of 
any  ship  which  should  import  a  Quaker  into  the  Colony,2 
and  at  the  same  time  an  old,  somewhat  dormant  law 
against  conventicles  was  revived. 

Henry  Townsend  of  Flushing  was  the  first  person 
to  suffer  under  this  new  system  of  extermination  which 
the  Governor  had  inaugurated.  He  was  found  guilty  of 
violation  of  the  conventicle  law  and  was  heavily  fined, 
but  he  absolutely  refused  to  pay  his  fine  though  he  found 
the  prison  into  which  he  was  thrown  extremely  "  irksome." 
His  wife,  however,  "  moved  by  the  cries  of  her  small 
children,"  gave  the  authorities  two  young  oxen  and  a 
horse  for  her  husband's  release.3  The  inhabitants  of 
Flushing  were  profoundly  stirred  by  this  invasion  of  their 
liberties.  They  gathered  in  a  public  meeting,  expressed 
their  disapproval  of  the  acts  of  persecution,  and  drew  up 
a  remonstrance  which  was  signed  by  thirty-one  men  and 
sent  to  the  Governor,  the  signers  of  which  included  the 
town  clerk  Edward  Hart,  who  wrote  the  document,  and 

1  Croese,  General  History  of  the  Quakers,  translated  (London,  1696),  ii.  157. 
*Lady  Moody  was  intimate  with  Governor  Stuyvesant,  which  fact  no  doubt  pro 
tected  her  meetings.     She,  however,  died  in  1663  soon  after  the  movement  began. 

2  Laws  and  Ordinances  of  New  Netherlands,  i.  439. 
8  Bishop,  pp.  218-219. 


224   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

the  sheriff,  Tobias  Feake.  The  remonstrance  declared 
that  the  patent,  or  charter,  of  their  town  "  grants  liberty 
of  conscience  without  modification,"  and  that  the  signers 
intended  to  stand  by  their  precious  rights  regardless  of 
what  it  might  cost  them  in  suffering.  They  say  in 
straightforward  fashion  : 

"  Right  Honourable,  you  have  been  pleased  to  send  up  unto 
us  a  certain  command  that  wee  should  not  receive  or  entertaine 
any  of  those  people  called  Quakers.  .  .  .  For  our  parte  wee  cannot 
condemn  them,  neither  can  wee  stretch  out  our  hands  against 
them.  .  .  .  Wee  desire  in  this  case  not  to  judge  least  wee  be  judged, 
neither  to  condemn  least  wee  be  condemned,  but  rather  let  every 
man  stand  or  fall  to  his  own.  Maister,  wee  are  bounde  by  the 
Law  to  doe  good  unto  all  men,  especially  to  those  of  the  House 
hold  of  faith ;  and  though  for  the  present  wee  seem  to  be  un- 
sensible  of  the  law  and  the  Lawgiver;  yet  when  death  and 
the  law  assault  us,  if  wee  have  not  our  Advocate  to  seeke,  who 
shall  plead  for  us  in  this  case  of  conscience  betwixt  God  and 
our  soules  ?  The  powers  of  this  world  can  neither  attack  us 
nor  excuse  us !  "  x 

A  number  of  these  thirty-one  signers  had  come  from 
Lynn  to  Long  Island  in  pursuit  of  the  precious  privilege 
of  religious  liberty ;  others  on  the  list  were  English 
Separatists  who,  like  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  had  lived  in 
Holland  to  escape  oppression  and  had  migrated  from 
there  to  the  New  World  under  promises  of  freedom.2 
They  knew  what  freedom  was  worth  and  they  were 
resolved  to  have  it,  even  "  though  death  and  the  law 
assault"  them. 

"  I  do  not  know,"  John  Fiske  says,  "  whether  Flushing  has 
ever  raised  a  fitting  monument  to  their  memory.  If  I  could 
have  my  way  I  would  have  the  protest  carved  on  a  stately 
obelisk  with  the  name  of  Edward  Hart,  town  clerk  and  the 
thirty  other  Dutch  and  English  names  appended,  and  would 
have  it  set  up  where  all  might  read  it  for  the  glory  of  the  town 
which  had  such  men  for  its  founders."  3 

The  vengeance  of  the  Governor  fell  with  severity  upon 

1  The  Remonstrance  is  given  in  full  in  Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New   York, 
i.  412.  2  See  Thompson's  Long  Island,  ii.  69. 

8  Dutch  and  Quaker  Colonies,  i.  235. 


CH.  r  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  225 

the  signers  of  the  remonstrance,  especially  upon  those  who 
held  official  positions,  and  the  town  of  Flushing  was 
deprived  by  the  Governor  of  its  right  to  hold  Town- 
meetings,  but  the  Governor's  course  did  not  crush  the 
spirit  of  these  earnest  men  who  insisted  on  "  the  excellent 
order  and  custom  of  the  Fatherland  "  ;  it  rather  hastened 
the  formation  of  a  Quaker  society  in  the  neighbourhood.1 
A  contemporary  record  says  that "  most  of  the  inhabitants 
of  Flushing  are  Quakers,  who  rove  about  the  country 
from  one  village  to  another,  corrupting  the  youth." 
Domine  Megapolensis  and  Drisius  report  in  1658  : 

"  The  raving  Quakers  have  not  settled  down,  but  continue 
to  disturb  the  people  of  this  province.  Although  our  govern 
ment  has  issued  orders  against  these  fanatics,  nevertheless  they 
do  not  fail  to  pour  forth  their  venom.  There  is  but  one  place 
in  New  England  where  they  are  tolerated  and  that  is  Rhode 
Island  which  is  the  sewer  of  New  England.  Thence  they  swarm 
to  and  fro  sowing  their  tares."  2 

Among  those  who  "  swarmed  "  into  Long  Island  in  this 
early  period  must  be  mentioned  Thomas  Thurston  and 
Josiah  Coale  who  passed  through  Long  Island  on  their 
foot-journey  from  Virginia  to  New  England.  They  were 
"  much  refreshed "  to  find  in  the  towns  of  Long  Island 
"  some  Friends  in  the  Truth," 3  and  there  seems  already 
in  1658  to  have  been  quite  a  nucleus  of  Quakers  in 
several  towns. 

The  next  year,  1659,  a  quaint  and  interesting  Friend, 
named  John  Taylor,  from  York,  England,  made  a  tour  of 
the  island.  He  writes  : 

"  It  came  into  my  heart  to  go  and  visit  the  people  of  Long 
Island  and  to  seek  the  lost.  And  it  pleased  the  Lord  so  to  order 
my  way,  that  I  found  in  several  towns  and  villages  a  pretty  many 

1  John  Tilton  and  his  wife  Mary,  the  wife  of  Joseph  Scott,  and  the  wife  of 
Francis  Weeks  were  among  those  who  had  to  endure  hard  persecutions.     Nine 
Quakers  were  in  the  jail  in  New  Amsterdam  at  one  time.      "Goody  Tilton,   wife 
of  John  Tilton,  was  charged  with  the  crime  of  having,  like  a  sorceress,  gone  from 
door  to  door  to  lure  and  seduce  the  people,  even  young  girls,  to  join  '  he  Quakers. " 
Her  husband  was  charged  with  having  ' '  permitted  Quakers  to  quake  at  his  house 
in  Gravesend." — Thompson's  Long  Island. 

2  Eccleiiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  433. 

3  Letter  of  Josiah  Coale  to  George  Bishop,  1658. — Bowden,  i.  18. 

Q 


226   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES   BK.  n 

fine,  sober  people  that  feared  God  and  were  convinced  of  the  blessed 
Truth.  They  did  receive  me  and  my  testimony  readily  with 
gladness.  Many  meetings  of  the  people  were  settled  under  the 
teaching  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  our  free  Teacher,  at 
Gravesend,  Seatancott,1  Oyster  Bay,  Hemsted,  and  other  places, 
sometimes  in  the  woods  and  wilderness."2 

Another  island  now  comes  into  prominence  in  the 
history  of  Quakerism,  "  Shelter  Island,"  near  the  east  end 
of  Long  Island,  between  Gardiner's  Bay  and  Peconis  Bay. 
It  was  originally  named  "  Farret's  Island,"  but  was 
purchased  by  three  citizens  of  Barbadoes,  Thomas  Rous, 
Constant  and  Nathaniel  Sylvester,  and  an  Englishman 
named  Thomas  Middleton.  They  paid  sixteen  hundred 
pounds  of  sugar  for  the  island.  The  Sylvesters  bought 
out  Rous'  share  in  1662,  and  by  the  payment  of  one 
hundred  and  fifty  pounds,  "  one  half  in  beef  and  the  other 
half  in  pork,"  the  owners  got  their  island  exempted 
for  ever  from  taxes  and  military  duty.8  Nathaniel 
Sylvester,  who  finally  came  into  possession  of  the  island, 
was  a  Quaker,  and  he  proceeded  to  make  his  island  a  real 
"  shelter  "  for  harried  Friends.  John  Taylor  landed  on  this 
island  on  his  way  out  from  England,  and  he  spent  some 
time  on  it  in  1659.  He  speaks  as  though  there  were 
already  many  Friends  on  the  island.  Beside  those 
already  there,  "  several  Friends,"  he  says,  "  came  from 
other  parts  in  New  England."  "  We  had  several  brave 
meetings  there  together,  and  the  Lord's  Power  and 
Presence  was  with  us  gloriously."  4 

George  Rofe,  an  Englishman,  gives  us  our  next 
glimpse  through  Quaker  eyes  of  the  Dutch  colony.  He 
sailed  in  1 66 1  "  in  a  small  boat  with  only  two  Friends," 
from  Maryland,  and  came  into  the  port  of  New 
Amsterdam.  He  writes  : 


1  "Seatancott"  must  mean  Setauket,  whose  inhabitants  in  1659  petitioned 
the  General  Court  of  Hartford  for  jurisdiction,  and  many  of  them  came  later  to 
Matinecock  as  Quakers,  for  example,  the  Underbills,  the  Cocks,  and  others. 

2  Memoir  of  John  Taylor  (London,  1710),  p.  18. 

3  Brodhead,  op.  tit.  ii.  106. 

*  Memoir  of  John  Taylor,  p.  22.     Lawrence  and  Cassandra  Southwick  came 
to  Shelter  Island  in  1659  to  escape  their  unbearable  persecutions  in  Salem. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  227 

"  I  had  good  service  among  both  Dutch  and  English.  I  was 
in  the  chief  city  of  the  Dutch,  and  gave  a  good  sound,  but  they 
forced  me  away ;  and  so  we  had  meetings  through  the  islands  in 
good  service." l 

The  little  society  in  Flushing  soon  found  a  yeoman 
leader  in  one  of  its  own  members,  John  Bowne,  "  the 
blameless  Bowne,"  as  Bancroft  calls  him.  He  had 
immigrated  from  Derbyshire,  first  to  Boston  and  then  to 
Long  Island  where  in  1656  he  married  Hannah  Field, 
who  became  attached  to  the  new  Society  in  Flushing, 
and  took  the  risks  of  going  to  the  meetings,  which  at 
first  were  held  in  the  woods  to  escape  the  notice  of 
those  who  were  hostile.  John  Bowne  out  of  curiosity 
went  with  his  wife  to  a  meeting,  was  impressed  with 
the  spiritual  reality  of  the  movement,  and  invited  the 
Friends  to  hold  their  meetings  in  his  house — a  fine 
dwelling-house  erected  in  1661  in  the  eastern  end  of  the 
village  near  two  magnificent  oak  trees.  He  soon  allied 
himself  positively  with  the  new  venture  and  became  a 
member  of  the  Society. 

It  was  quickly  reported  that  the  Bowne  house  had 
become  a  "  conventicle  "  for  Quakers,  and  the  owner  was 
arrested,  fined  £25,  and  threatened  with  banishment  on 
non-payment.  The  threat,  as  usual,  made  no  impression. 
At  the  end  of  three  months,  during  which  Bowne  had  lain 
in  prison,  an  Order  was  passed  in  Council  to  transport 
him,  "  if  he  continues  obstinate  and  pervicacious,"  from 
the  province,  "  for  the  welfare  of  the  community,  and  to 
crush  as  far  as  it  is  possible  that  abominable  sect  who 
treat  with  contempt  both  the  political  magistrates  and  the 
ministers  of  God's  holy  Word,  and  endeavour  to  undermine 
the  police  and  religion."  He  did  continue  "  pervicacious," 
and  was  transported  by  the  ship  Gilded  Fox  to  Amsterdam. 
Upon  landing  he  laid  his  case  before  the  Directors  of  the 
West  India  Company,  and  as  soon  as  their  liberty-loving 
spirits  were  wakened  they  gave  him  satisfaction — "  they 
spoke  no  word  tending  to  the  approval  of  what  had  been 
clone  against  Quakers." 

1  A.R.B.  Collection  (Devonshire  House),  No.  62. 


228    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

They  wrote  a  letter  to  Stuyvesant,  not  quite  as 
dramatic  in  its  delivery  as  the  "  King's  Missive "  in 
Massachusetts,  but  absolutely  effective  for  its  purpose. 
The  substance  of  the  message  was  : 

"  It  is  our  opinion  that  some  connivance  is  useful,  and  that 
the  consciences  of  men  ought  to  remain  free  and  unshackled. 
Let  every  one  remain  free  as  long  as  he  is  modest,  moderate,  and 
his  political  conduct  irreproachable." l 

Soon  after  his  return  as  a  free  man,  John  Bowne  was 
walking  the  street  of  Flushing  and  met  the  Governor. 
The  chief  magistrate  "  seemed  much  abashed  for  what  he 
had  done,"  but  showed  his  manliness  by  saying,  "  I  am 
glad  to  see  you  safe  home  again."  The  straightforward 
Quaker  acknowledged  his  greeting  and  added,  "  I  hope 
thou  wilt  never  harm  any  more  Friends." 2  And  he  never 
did.  Bowne's  victory  had,  as  moral  victories  generally  do 
have,  far-reaching  consequences.  He  not  only  won  his 
personal  freedom,  but  he  called  forth  from  the  Directors 
of  the  Colony  a  proclamation  of  the  principle  of  complete 
religious  toleration,  "  The  consciences  of  men  ought  to 
remain  free  and  unshackled."  But  that  was  not  all.  When 
the  next  year  the  Colony  was  conquered  by  the  English, 
an  article  establishing  "  liberty  of  conscience  in  divine 
worship  and  church  discipline "  for  all  Dutch  subjects  was 
put  in  the  articles  of  agreement  surrendering  the  territory. 
In  1664,  the  year  the  Colony  passed  into  English  control, 
the  "  Duke's  law "  provided  that  "  no  person  shall  be 
molested,  fined,  or  imprisoned  for  differing  in  judgment 
in  matters  of  religion,"  and  from  that  time  on  the 
principle  was  recognised  throughout  the  Colony  as  a 
fundamental  right,  though  in  practice  it  was  still  occasion 
ally  violated.3 

1  Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  530.     Bowden's  History  (i.  324-325) 
gives  the  correspondence  in  full. 

2  Bishop,  p.  423. 

3  There  were  sporadic  attempts  to  harry  the  Quakers  throughout  the  seventeenth 
century,  always  in  the  interests  of  the  Established  Church.      I  have  found  this 
interesting  letter  from   Richard  Gildersleeve,   constable,  to  Governor  Andros  of 
New  York  : 

' '  RIGHT  HONORABLE — Whereas  your  honor  was  pleased  to  lay  some  command 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  229 

The  Colony  became  English  territory  by  the  terms  of 
surrender  in  1664,  and  was  organised  as  a  British  Colony 
with  a  Governor  from  the  mother  country.  It  was  re 
conquered  by  the  Dutch  in  1673,  but  with  the  settlement 
of  peace  in  1674  it  was  restored  to  the  English.  The 
little  groups  of  Friends  in  the  Colony  were  in  this 
transition  period  much  expanded,  and  entered  upon  a 
new  stage  of  their  development,  as  a  result  of  the  visits 
of  important  missionary  Friends.  The  first  of  these 
constructive  visits  was  that  of  John  Burnyeat,  who  makes 
the  first  mention  we  have  of  a  permanent  organisation  of 
the  Friends  on  Long  Island.  He  writes  : 

"I  arrived  at  New  York  the  2yth  day  of  Second  month 
[April  old  style]  1671,  and  from  New  York  I  went  to  Long 
Island,  and  visited  Friends  on  the  island  and  other  places  there 
away  [probably  Shelter  Island],  and  was  with  them  at  their  half- 
year's  meeting  at  Oyster  Bay." * 

Burnyeat  was  back  again  for  extended  work  at  the 
end  of  six  months,  when  he  visited  all  the  meetings  on 
the  island,  and  attended  again  the  Half- Year's  Meeting  at 
Oyster  Bay.2 

"  The  Lord's  power  broke  in  upon  the  meeting,  and  Friends' 
hearts  were  broken,  and  there  were  great  meltings  among  us. 
Friends  were  comforted  and  the  seed  and  life  reigned  over  all." 3 


upon  mee  for  the  prevention  of  Quaker  Meettings  within  our  towne  of  Hemstead, 
which  accordingly  I  have  done  to  the  best  of  my  power  by  forewarning  Captain 
John  Seman.  Being  sick  and  not  able  to  go  myself,  I  sent  two  overseers  to  fore 
warn  him  that  he  should  not  entertain  any  such  meeting  att  his  house,  yett  nott 
withstanding  his  answer  was  that  he  tooke  no  notice  of  the  warning,  and  proceeded 
to  have  and  had  a  very  great  meeting  the  lastt  Lordsday  being  the  28th  of  this 
instant  Hopping  these  few  lines  may  find  your  honors  favorable  acceptance,  and 
render  mee  excusable,  and  thatt  your  Honor  will  be  pleased  to  take  it  in  to  your 
serious  consideration  for  the  ffuter  pruention  of  the  like :  nott  troubleing  your 
Honor  any  further  I  remain  Your  Honors  Humble  seruantt  Richard  Gildersleeve, 
Hemstead,  May  26,  1679." — Ecclesiastical  Records  of  New  York,  i.  723. 

1  Journal  of  John  Burnyeat,   p.    196.     This  Oyster  Bay  Half- Year's  Meeting 
was  until  1695  a  part  of  New  England  Yearly  Meeting. 

2  He  found  the  Long  Island  Friends  at  this  time  somewhat   divided,  as  a 
result  of  the  influence  of  a  party  in  England  opposed  to  George  Fox  and   the 
system  of  organisation  which  was  being  put  into  operation.      The  contention 
was  increased  at  this  time  because  Burnyeat  had  brought  with  him  a  copy  of 
Fox's  Book  of  Advice  and  Discipline,  and  the  Ranters  produced  their  "Book" 
in  opposition. — See  Journal,  pp.  197-198. 

8  Journal,  p.  198. 


230   QUAKERS    IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

On  his  way  south,  Burnyeat  held  a  meeting  in  New 
York  City,  which  is  the  first  mention  I  have  found  of 
a  Quaker  meeting  held  on  Manhattan  Island. 

At  the  next  gathering  of  the  Oyster  Bay  Half- Year's 
Meeting,  in  April  of  1672,  the  great  founder  himself, 
George  Fox,  was  present,  having  travelled  from  Maryland 
by  forced  marches — "  earnestly  pressed  in  spirit  " — to  get 
to  Long  Island  in  time  for  it.  Fox  writes  : 

"The  Half  year's  meeting  began  on  First  day  of  the  week 
and  lasted  four  days.  The  first  and  second  days  we  had  public 
meetings  for  worship,  to  which  people  of  all  sorts  came.  On 
the  third  day  were  the  men's  and  women's  meetings  wherein  the 
affairs  of  the  church  were  taken  care  of."  l 

He  found,  as  Burnyeat  had  the  year  before,  some  "  con 
tentious  spirits "  who  were  making  trouble.  He  met 
them  face  to  face  to  consider  their  objections  and  com 
plaints,  and  "  the  Lord's  power  broke  forth  gloriously,  and 
the  Truth  of  God  was  exalted  and  set  over  all." 2 

On  his  way  back  from  New  England  Fox  visited 
Shelter  Island.  He  had  a  famous  meeting  with  the 
Indians  on  the  little  island. 

"I  had  a  meeting,"  he  writes,  "with  the  Indians,  at  which 
were  their  king,  his  council,  and  about  a  hundred  Indians  more. 
They  sat  down  like  Friends  and  listened  attentively.  After 
meeting  they  appeared  very  loving,  and  confessed  that  what  was 
said  to  them  was  Truth.  Next  First-day  we  had  a  great  meeting 
on  the  island,  to  which  came  many  people  who  had  never  heard 
Friends  before.  .  .  .  They  were  much  taken  with  the  Truth."3 

After  a  very  stormy  passage  he  got  to  Oyster  Bay, 
where  he  had  "  a  very  large  meeting,"  and,  in  company 
with  Christopher  Holder  and  James  Lancaster,  he  went 
across  the  Sound,  "  to  the  continent,"  as  he  calls  it,  and 
held  a  meeting  at  Rye,  at  that  time  in  "  Winthrop's 
territory  "  (i.e.  in  Connecticut) ;  then  to  Flushing,  "  where 
we  had  a  very  large  meeting,  many  hundreds  of  people 
being  there,  some  of  whom  came  about  thirty  miles  to 

1  Fox's  Journal,  ii.  167. 

2  Ibid.  ii.  168.     There  are  evidences  in  all  the  Journals  of  the  period  that 
there   were   many  Ranters  to   be  found  in  the  Colonies  as  there  were  also   in 
England.  *  Ibid.  ii.  172. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  231 

it.      A  glorious  and  heavenly  meeting  it  was,"  and,  finally, 
"  three  precious  meetings  "  at  Gravesend.1 

This  work  was  immediately  followed  up  and  carried 
farther  by  the  great  colonial  missionary  of  Quakerism, 
William  Edmundson.  His  Journal  for  1672  says  : 

"  I  took  passage  by  sea  [from  Maryland]  and  about  ten  days 
after  landed  at  New  York  where  no  Friends  lived.  We  lodged 
at  a  Dutch  woman's  house  who  kept  an  inn.  I  was  moved  of 
the  Lord  to  get  a  meeting  in  that  town,  for  there  had  not  been 
one  there  before.2  I  spoke  to  the  woman  of  the  house  to  let 
us  have  a  meeting.  She  let  us  have  a  large  dining-room  and 
furnished  it  with  seats.  We  gave  notice  of  it  and  had  a  brave, 
large  meeting!  Some  of  the  chief  officers,  magistrates,  and 
leading  men  of  the  Town  were  at  it ;  very  attentive  they  were, 
the  Lord's  power  being  over  them  all.  Several  of  them  appeared 
very  loving  after  the  meeting.  The  woman  of  the  house  and 
her  daughter,  both  being  widows,  both  wept  when  we  went 
away."  3 

Edmundson  followed  the  regular  Quaker  route  through 
Long  Island  eastward,  finding  "  many  honest,  tender 
Friends  "  in  the  towns,  and  having  a  memorable  visit  with 
the  Friends  on  Shelter  Island,  from  whom  he  "  parted  in 
the  sweet  love  of  God  "  for  New  England 

On  his  return  journey,  having  "  set  all  the  town  [of 
Hartford]  a-talking  of  religion,"  he  crossed  to  Long 
Island.  Here  he  found  an  outbreak  of  Ranterism : 

"  Friends  were  much  troubled  in  their  meetings  with  several 
who  had  gone  from  Truth  and  turned  Ranters.  They  would 
come,  both  men  and  women,  into  Friends'  meetings,  singing  and 
dancing  in  a  rude  manner  which  was  a  great  exercise  [annoyance] 
to  Friends.  We  staid  sometime  and  had  large  and  precious 
meetings,  at  several  places.  Many  of  the  Ranters  came  to  the 
meetings  and  the  Lord's  power  was  over  them  and  chained  them 
down.  Some  of  them  were  reached  and  brought  back  to  the 
Truth."4 

1  Fox's  Journal,  ii.  174. 

2  Edmundson  is  wrong  in  this  statement,  as  Burnyeat  had  held  one  in  the 
city  before  this. 

3  Edmundson's  Journal,  p.  64. 

4  Ibid.    p.    92.      These   Ranters    apparently  did   not  stay    ' '  chained, ''   for 
Thomas  Chalkley,  writing  in  1698  of  his  visit  to  Long  Island,  says:  "  I  met  with 
some  of  the  people  called  Ranters  who  disturbed  our  meeting.     I  may  say  as 
the  apostle  Paul  did,  that  I  fought  with  beasts  there  !  " — CbaXkley's  Journal,  p.  22. 


232    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

As  has  already  been  said,  there  was,  at  least  in  all  the 
northern  Colonies,  in  the  seventeenth  century  a  large  and 
dangerous  sprinkling  of  Ranters.  They  did  not  originate 
from  the  Quakers,  as  they  ante-dated  the  latter  by  some 
years.  They  were  a  part  of  a  widespread,  though  some 
what  chaotic  movement  in  England,1  and  there  was  an 
out-cropping  of  the  same  tendency  in  America.  Among 
the  groups  of  Anabaptists,  Seekers,  and  so-called 
"  Antinomians,"  wherever  they  appeared,  there  formed 
a  radical  wing  composed  of  those  who  were  less  stable 
mentally,  less  organized  morally,  and  less  under  the  social 
direction  of  the  groups  to  which  they  belonged.  The 
Friends,  with  their  lack  of  ecclesiastical  authority,  and 
with  their  doctrine  of  the  Light  within,  were  almost  certain 
to  suffer  from  the  Ranter  propagandism,  and  the  move 
ment  did  pick  off  some  of  the  members  who  were 
ill-balanced  and  easy  subjects  of  fanaticism.  The  Quaker 
leaders  had  powerfully  proclaimed  the  possibility  of 
complete  salvation  from  sin,  and  it  was  only  to  be 
expected  that  some  emotional  Quakers,  especially  such 
as  had  a  strain  of  hysteria,  would  make  extravagant 
claims.  One  illustration  of  this  Ranter  tendency  will 
suffice,  taken  from  the  Annals  of  Newtown,  Long  Island. 

"There  resided  at  the  English  Hills  in  Newtown  several 
individuals  holding  the  religious  opinion  of  the  Quakers. 
Among  them  was  Thomas  Case,  who  assumed  the  office  of 
preacher,  and  at  his  house  the  faithful  were  wont  to  convene  for 
worship.  He  set  up  a  new  form  of  Quakerism,  and  labored  with 
great  zeal  to  promulgate  his  views,  not  unfrequently  continuing 
his  meetings  many  days  in  succession.  Inspired  with  a  fancied 
holiness  of  his  character  and  office  he  asserted  that  he  was  come 
to  perfection  and  could  sin  no  more  than  Christ,  and  he  maintained 
that  when  he  should  die  he  would  rise  again  the  third  day."  2 

This  "  new  sort  of  Quakerism,"  as  this  chronicler  calls 
it,  ran  into  a  wild  fanaticism,  and  these  "  half-Quakers  " 
were  dealt  with  vigorously  in  1675  by  the  town  authorities. 

1  See  my  Studies    in  Mystical    Religion,    the   chapter   on    ' '  Seekers    and 
Ranters." 

a  Annals  of  Newtown,  pp.  93-95. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  233 

They  were  also  vigorously  dealt  with  by  the  Quaker 
meeting  itself,  as  the  following  minute  of  Westbury 
Quarterly  Meeting  indicates : 

"At  a  Quarterlie  Meeting  ye  3©th  day  of  ye  6th  mo.  1675, 
We  ye  people  of  God,  being  weightily  meett  in  ye  feare  and  dread 
of  ye  Lord,  being  much  conserned  in  our  Spirits  considering  a 
people  that  is  arisen  in  this  day  which  calleth  themselves  by  ye 
name  Friends.  These  people  oppose  and  denye  ye  truth  of  our 
Lord  Jesus  and  speak  evill  of  his  way  and  people,  wherefore  we 
ye  people  of  God,  being  seriously  meett  together  in  ye  name  and 
feare  of  ye  Lord,  felling  ye  out-running  of  those  people  to  be  as 
a  weight  vpon  vs,  we,  in  obedience  vnto  god  and  his  blessed 
truth,  doe  vnanimusly  signify6  our  dislike  of  yt  spirit  they  are 
guided  by  and  give  forth  our  testimonies  against  it. 

Whereas  those  people  being  risen  in  ye  pretence  of  ye  truth 
in  this  western  part  of  Long  Island  and  some  upon  ye  main,  who 
call  themselues  young  Friends  or  new  friends,  the  leading  persons 
of  them  being  Thomas  Case,  Garsham  Lockwood,  Lydia  fibster, 
Elizabeth  Cleave,  with  many  others  against  whom  we  bear 
testimony  for  their  confused  practices,  and  have  openly  denied 
their  Spirit  of  delusion  by  which  they  are  led  and  guided,  yet 
the  presisting  in  and  by  ye  deluding  spirit  and  dark  power  wch 
opperates  in  them  has  bretrayed  many  into  ye  same  snare  wherein 
they  become  the  country's  discourse,  wherefore  we  are  nessecitated 
for  ye  baring  of  ye  precious  truth  and  for  ye  renouncing  aspera- 
tions  yt  may  arise  of  us  cleare  from  owning  their  way  or  evill 
practices  to  be  in  or  by  ye  Spirit  or  power  of  God,  and  do  giue 
forth  our  public  testimonies  to  all  yt  may  see  ye  same,  yt  we 
utterly  deny  them  and  all  yt  joyned  in  those  confused  practices, 
and  ye  spirit  and  power  by  wch  they  are  led  and  guided." l 

Two  official  reports  of  this  period  throw  some  light  on 
the  place  which  the  Quakers  held  in  the  estimation  of 
the  Government.  The  first  extract  is  from  the  Report  of 

1  Minutes  of  Westbury  Quarterly  Meeting.  The  following  letter  from 
Edward  Taylor  to  Increase  Mather  may  possibly  throw  a  glimpse  of  light  upon 
these  "  new  Quakers,"  though  it  is  more  probable  that  the  incident  reported  is  a 
fiction  of  the  imagination  of  minds  always  on  the  watch  for  signs  of  witchcraft 
and  for  signs  that  the  Quakers  were  objects  of  divine  disapproval.  Edward 
Taylor  writes,  January  22,  1683  :  "  At  Mattatuck,  about  16  miles  S.W.  from 
Farmington,  about  10  o'clock  at  night,  there  was  seen  by  about  6  or  7  men  a 
black  streake  in  the  skie  like  a  rainbow.  .  .  .  About  the  same  time  it  was 
credibly  reported  with  us  that  the  Quakers  upon  Long  Island  were  on  the  Lord's 
day  to  have  a  horse  race,  and  the  riders  mounted  for  the  race  were  dismounted 
again  by  the  All  Righteous  offended  Judge  striking  them  with  tortuering  pains 
whereof  they  both  &K&." —Massachusetts  Historical  Society  Collections,  Part  iv. 
voL  viii.  p.  630. 


234   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

Governor  Andros  on  the  religious  condition  of  the  Province 
of  New  York  in  1678,  and  the  second  extract  is  from  a 
similar  Report  made  by  Governor  Donegan  in  1687  : 

"  There  are  here  Religions  of  all  sorts,  one  church  of  England, 
several  Presbiterians  and  Independents,  Quakers  and  Anabaptists 
of  several  sects,  some  Jews,  but  Presbiterians  and  Independents 
most  numerous  and  substantial." l 

"Here  bee  many  of  the  Church  of  England;  few  Roman 
Catholick ;  abundance  of  Quaker  Preachers^  men  and  women ; 
especially  Singing  Quakers,  Ranting  Quakers."  * 

One  of  the  most  memorable  and  historically  important 
of  the  many  missionary  visits  to  Long  Island  for  the 
purpose  of  extending  Quakerism  was  that  of  Samuel 
Bownas  of  England,  a  young  man  of  twenty-five  at  the 
time  of  his  visit  in  1702.  He  appointed  a  meeting,  soon 
after  his  arrival,  at  Hempstead  in  a  great  barn  and  it  was 
attended  by  a  crowd  of  people.  At  the  instigation  of 
George  Keith,  formerly  a  leading  exponent  of  Quakerism, 
but  at  this  time  a  bitter  opponent  of  Friends,8  who  had 
followed  Bownas  from  Philadelphia  in  order  to  block  his 
work,  a  warrant  was  sworn  out,  charging  Bownas  with 
"  speaking  lies  and  reflections  against  the  Church  of 
England  "  in  his  sermon  at  Hempstead.  When  the  High 
Sheriff,  accompanied  by  a  posse  of  men  "  armed  with  guns, 
swords,  pitchforks,  clubs  and  halberts  "  came  to  arrest  the 
prisoner,  the  Half-year's  Meeting  was  in  session  at  Flushing 
(29th  November  1702),  and  Samuel  Bownas  was  sitting 
in  the  ministers'  gallery.  The  Sheriff  marched  up  the 
aisle,  pulled  out  his  warrant,  and  said  "You  are  my 
prisoner."  After  some  parley  the  Sheriff  consented  to 
wait  till  meeting  was  over,  and  his  men  piled  up  their 
motley  arms  at  the  door  and  all  sat  down  in  the  Quaker 
meeting.  The  "  silence  "  at  first  astonished  the  officers  of 
the  law,  but  as  they  were  beginning  to  whisper  that  Bownas 

1  Governor  Andros1  Report  on  the  Province  of  New  York  in  1678. — Doc.  Hist. 
New  York,  \.  92. 

z  Ibid.  L  186,  Governor  Donegan's  Report  on  the  Province  in  1687.  The 
"Singing  Quakers"  and  "Ranting  Quakers"  naturally  made  an  impression, 
though  they  were  certainly  few  in  number. 

*  For  an  extended  treatment  of  Keith,  see  Book  V.  Chapter  II. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  235 

was  frightened  by  the  show  of  force,  he  felt  "  the  Word 
like  a  fire  and  stood  up  and  had  a  very  agreeable  service." 
At  the  close  of  the  meeting  the  Sheriff  gave  him  an 
extension  of  liberty  until  the  Half- Year's  Meeting  was 
concluded,  at  the  last  gathering  of  which  "  near  two 
thousand  people  "  were  present. 

At  the  hearing  before  the  Justices,  Bownas  was  asked 
to  give  £2000  bail  or  be  committed  to  the  common 
jail.  His  answer  was,  "  If  the  bail  were  fixed  at  three 
half-pence  I  would  not  give  it"  One  of  the  Justices 
thereupon  took  him  to  his  own  house  for  the  night,  and 
the  next  day  he  was  committed  to  jail  for  three  months, 
at  the  end  of  which  time  he  was  brought  before  the  court 
of  Oyer  and  Terminer,  Chief  Justice  John  Bridges  presiding. 
The  grand  jury  refused  to  bring  a  true  bill  against  Bownas. 
The  judge  was  thereupon  very  angry  with  them  and 
endeavoured  to  compel  them  by  threats  of  imprisonment 
and  fine,  but  one  of  the  jurors  boldly  answered  :  "  You  may 
hang  us  by  the  heels  if  you  please,  but  if  you  do  the 
matter  will  be  carried  to  Westminster  Hall ;  for  juries, 
whether  grand  or  petty,  are  not  to  be  menaced  with 
threats,  but  are  to  act  freely." l  The  browbeating  continued 
over  to  the  next  day,  but  the  men  remained  unmoved  and 
stood  for  the  privilege  of  juries.  Whereupon  the  judge 
declared  in  wrath,  "  As  justice  cannot  be  come  at  here, 
I  will  send  the  prisoner  to  London  chained  to  the  deck  of 
a  man-of-war." 

As  Samuel  Bownas  was  sitting  alone,  wondering  what 
the  issue  of  his  case  would  be,  an  old  man  named  Thomas 
Hicks,  who  had  been  chief-justice  of  the  province,  came 
to  see  him,  took  him  in  his  arms,  and  with  tears  in  his 
eyes  said,  "  The  Lord  has  used  you  as  an  instrument  to 
put  a  stop  to  arbitrary  proceedings  in  our  courts  of  justice. 
There  has  never  been  so  successful  a  stand  made  against 
it  as  at  this  time.  You  need  not  fear  ;  they  can  no  more 
send  you  to  England  than  they  can  send  me." 

The  prisoner  was,  however,  confined,  by  order  of  the 

1  The  judicial  decision  in  the  Bushnell  case,  which  arose  out  of  the  trial  of 
Penn  and  Mead,  had  settled  the  law  that  no  jury  could  be  fined  for  its  verdict. 


236   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

judge,  in  a  small  room  made  of  logs,  where  he  was  kept 
until  October  1703,  and  then  set  free  because  the  jury 
again  refused  to  find  a  bill  against  him.  He  had  supported 
himself  in  prison  by  making  shoes  ;  getting  his  bread,  he 
says,  "  with  my  own  hands,  as  was  agreeable  with  Paul's 
practice."  Having  been  held  a  close  prisoner  almost  an 
entire  year,  he  received  "  a  kind  of  triumph "  on  his 
release,  and  "visited  every  corner  of  the  island,  and  had 
very  large  and  open  meetings."  He  had  an  odd  dream 
at  Cowneck  : 

"I  dreamed,"  he  says,  "that  an  honest  Friend  was  fishing  in 
a  large  stone  cistern,  with  a  crooked  pin  for  a  hook,  a  small 
switch  stick  for  rod,  and  a  piece  of  thread  for  line ;  and  George 
Fox  [who  died  twelve  years  before]  came  and  told  me  that  there 
were  three  fishes  in  that  place,  and  desired  me  to  take  the 
tackling  of  the  Friend  since  he  lacked  the  skill  to  handle  the 
matter.  Then,  methought,  the  Friend  gave  me  the  rod,  and  the 
first  time  I  threw  in  I  caught  a  fine  fish.  George  Fox  then  bade 
me  try  again,  for  there  were  two  more  in  the  place.  I  did  and 
took  up  another.  He  bade  me  cast  once  more.  I  did  and  took 
the  third.  Now,  said  George,  there  are  no  more  there  !  " 

The  next  day  at  meeting  Bownas  had  forgotten  the 
dream  as  though  it  had  not  been.  A  Friend  rose  and 
spoke  for  a  little  on  universal  grace.  As  soon  as  he 
stopped,  Bownas,  with  "  his  heart  full  of  the  matter,"  took 
up  the  same  subject  and  landed  his  fish :  "  We  had  a 
blessed  meeting  and  the  dream  came  true  ! " * 

Thomas  Story's  Journal  is  a  valuable  source  of  in 
formation  on  the  condition  and  growth  of  Quakerism  in 
New  York.2  He  visited  New  York  City  for  the  first  time 
in  1 699,  having  "  a  small  meeting  "  there.  He  gives  us 
the  interesting  information  that  he  "  fell  in  opportunely 
with  a  Yearly  Meeting  at  Westchester  on  the  main, 
about  twenty  miles  from  New  York." s  He  found  a  good 
many  Ranters  still  in  evidence  on  Long  Island,  one  of 

1  A  meeting  was  soon  after  established  there.     The  Bownas  incidents  are  told 
in  his  Life  and  Travels  (London,  1761),  pp.  61-95. 

2  Journal  of  Thomas  Story. 

3  Ibid.  p.  177.     This  was  evidently  not  a  Yearly  Meeting  for  church  affairs, 
but  a  General  Meeting  for  the  purpose  of  ' '  expanding  Quakerism. ' ' 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  237 

whom  "  hooted  like  an  owl  and  made  a  ridiculous  noise 
as  their  manner  is  !  " l  He  had  "  glorious  meetings  "  in 
most  of  the  Long  Island  towns  ;  he  speaks  of  a  "  Quarterly 
Meeting "  at  Westbury  and  one  in  New  York  City,  and 
he  held  a  great  meeting  by  appointment  at  Westchester, 
"  across  the  sound,"  to  which  "  an  abundance  of  people 
came  from  as  far  as  Horseneck."  "  The  people,"  he  says, 
"  were  very  still  and  affected  with  the  testimony  of 
Truth."2 

While  they  were  at  Newtown,  a  part  of  the  present 
city  of  Brooklyn,  report  reached  him  of  the  "  pestilential 
fever"  which  was  then  raging  in  Philadelphia.  He  and 
his  companion,  Roger  Gill,  were  eager  to  go  to  their 
"  distressed  friends  "  in  Philadelphia,  but  felt  called  before 
leaving  to  hold  a  meeting  in  New  York  City,  where  "  the 
people  seemed  to  have  good  understandings  generally." 
The  meeting  was  appointed  at  the  request  of  Thomas 
Story,  and  was  held  in  the  house  of  Thomas  Roberts,  "  a 
convinced  man  in  the  heart  of  the  city."  "  The  room 
was  large,  and  all  about  the  doors  and  windows  were  full 
of  people,"  but  Thomas  Story  got  no  chance  to  speak. 
"  I  had,"  he  says,  "  a  great  weight  and  exercise  on  my 
mind,  but  Roger  Gill  stept  in  between  and  took  up  most 
of  the  seasonable  time,  till  my  spirit  almost  sunk  under 
the  load  ;  and  while  it  was  working  up  the  second  time 
after  he  sat  down,  Samuel  Jenings  stood  up  and  took  the 
rest  [of  the  time] ;  and  then  I  totally  fell  under  it,  and 
was  greatly  oppressed  in  spirit,  though  I  bore  it  un  discerned 
by  any  !  " 3  He  came  back  from  Philadelphia  before  the 
end  of  the  year  (1699),  and  had  another  meeting  in  the 
same  house  "...  the  concern  having  remained  in  secret," 
i.e.  on  his  mind.  This  meeting  was  large  and  he  delivered 
himself  of  his  "  concern,"  and  was  "  fully  clear  and  easy." 4 
In  1702  he  had  "a  glorious  meeting  in  the  new  meeting 
house  "  at  Westbury.  "  Many  hundreds  of  Friends  and 
abundance  of  other  people  were  there.  The  meeting 
being  over,  there  came  over  the  Plains  with  us  at  least 

1  Journal  of  Thomas  Story,  p.  220.  2  Ibid.  p.  221. 

3  Ibid,  p.  222.  *  Ibid.  p.  243. 


238    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

100  horse  to  their  several  habitations."  ]  In  1703  he  was 
at  a  meeting  in  Westchester,  "  which  was  more  open 
than  usual  in  that  place."  Toward  the  end  of  1704  he 
went  to  New  York  City,  having  heard  that  Lord  Cornbury, 
the  Governor  of  the  Colony,  was  going  to  arrest  him  if  he 
ever  came  into  that  jurisdiction  again.  "  I  was,"  he  says, 
"  at  the  Sheriff's  house  several  times,  but  the  Lord  preserved 
me  free  to  the  service  of  the  blessed  Truth."  2 

The  Journal  of  James  Dickinson  gives  a  good  picture 
of  conditions  in  1698  : 

"We  crossed  Amboy  ferry  in  two  canoes,  which  the  water 
men  lashed  together  to  carry  our  horses  over.  Next  day  we 
went  to  Elizabeth-town  [New  Jersey],  took  boat  for  New  York, 
and  were  all  night  upon  the  water,  being  exposed  to  wind  and 
storm :  it  rained  all  night  and  we  had  no  shelter,  for  the  boat 
was  filled  with  wood  and  we  sat  upon  it.  About  break  of  day 
we  got  to  New  York  where  we  staid  a  little ;  then  passed  over 
in  a  canoe  to  Long  Island,  and  travelled  up  and  down,  laboring 
in  the  work  of  the  gospel ;  and  had  good  service  for  the  Truth. 
Several  were  convinced,  particularly  a  captain  in  the  army  and  a 
justice  of  the  peace,  who  were  afterwards  called  before  the 
Governor  of  New  York ;  and  because  they  could  neither  swear 
nor  fight  any  longer,  they  laid  down  their  commissions,  having 
received  the  Truth  in  the  love  of  it.  In  New  York  City  many 
hearts  were  deeply  affected  and  tendered,  both  among  the  Dutch 
and  English,  and  the  Lord's  power  was  over  all."  s 

Thomas  Chalkley,  the  great  Quaker  traveller  in  the 
first  half  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  one  of  the  fore 
most  instruments  in  the  expansion  of  New  York 
Quakerism.  He  had  already  visited  Long  Island  near 
the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century — "  fighting  beasts  " 
there, — but  his  important  visit  came  in  1704.  He 
travelled  by  horse  and  canoe  from  North  Carolina, 
having  narrow  escapes  from  rattlesnakes,  and 

"  Lodging  like  good  Jacob  on  his  way  to  Padan  Aram.  Very 
sweet  was  the  love  of  God  to  my  soul  as  I  waked,  and  the  dew 
of  the  everlasting  love  refreshed  me." 4 

I  Journal  of  Thomas  Story,  p.  256.  z  Ibid.  p.  370. 

II  Journal  of  James  Dickinson,  in  "  Friends'  Library,"  vol.  xii.  p.  393. 
4  Journal  of  Thomas  Chalkley,  p.  38. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM   IN   NEW  YORK  239 

"  So  we  travelled  on  to  New  York  and  Long  Island,  where  we 
had  divers  meetings,  as  at  Flushing,  Westbury,  Jerusalem,  Jerico, 
Bethpage,  Matinicook,  and  also  at  West  Chester  on  the  main" l 

On  his  return  journey  Thomas  Chalkley  had  large 
and  powerful  meetings  again  through  Long  Island.  A 
still  more  constructive  tour  was  made  by  Thomas 
Chalkley  through  the  New  York  meetings,  especially  on 
Long  Island,  in  1724.  Much  new  ground  was  broken, 
and  many  "  were  convinced  of  the  Principle  of  Truth." 
He  visited  Westchester  again,  and  held  a  meeting  at 
Newtown  which  was  so  large  that  the  meeting-house 
could  not  contain  the  people.  He  held  a  meeting  with 
"  those  few  Friends  at  New  York — the  quietest  meeting  I 
ever  had  there  ! " 2 

Edmund  Peckover  visited  Long  Island  in  1743.  He, 
however,  gives  only  one  or  two  concrete  pictures  of  the 
actual  state  of  things  there  then.  He  attended  the 
Yearly  Meeting  at  Flushing  that  year,  and  he  says  that 
"  the  Top  Sort  of  people  for  many  miles  round  about  the 
country  were  there."  He  reports  but  few  Friends  in  New 
York  City,  but  the  yellow  fever  was  raging  at  the  time  of 
Peckover's  visit,  and  he  did  not  see  the  city  in  its  normal 
conditions.8  William  Reckitt  visited  the  meetings 
through  this  region  in  1758,  and  his  report  indicates  that 
a  decline  had  set  in  on  Long  Island.  "  Lukewarmness 
and  indifference  much  prevailed,"  he  says.  Again,  he 
makes  the  comment  that  "  at  Oister  Bay  there  had  been 
a  large  meeting,  but  now  it  was  much  declined."  * 

The  last  account  which  I  shall  give  of  conditions 
in  the  Colony  in  the  eighteenth  century  shows  that 
crystallisation  was  settling  down  upon  Quakerism,  and 
that  the  period  of  expansion  was  over.  It  is  from  the 
Journal  of  John  Griffith  of  England,  who  visited  the  New 
York  meetings  in  1765  : 

"Quarterly  Meeting  at  Flushing  (2 2nd  of  Fifth  Month)  was 
small,  and  things,  as  to  the  life  of  religion,  were  felt  to  be  very 

1  Journal  of  Thomas  Chalkley,  p.  39.  2  Ibid.  pp.  118-120. 

3  For  Peckover's  Journal  see  Journal  of  Friends'  Historical  Society,  vol.  i.  pp. 
95-109.  4  William  Reckitfs  Life,  pp.  120-121. 


240   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  u 

low,  a  painful  gloominess  having  spread  itself  through  a  want  of 
living  concern  in  many  of  the  members  .  .  .  the  vital  part  of 
religion  seemed  to  be  much  obstructed." 1 

Griffith's  Journal  introduces  us  to  a  number  of  new 
meetings,  which  had  been  established  by  migration  and 
expansion,  like  a  chain  of  forts,  running  north  from  Long 
Island  Sound,  parallel  to  the  Hudson,  between  the  river 
and  the  Connecticut  line,  but  he  sees  almost  everywhere 
the  marks  of  deadness  : 

"We  went  to  New  Milford  meeting  [in  the  Edge  of 
Connecticut]  on  Firstday  the  3rd  of  Eighth  month.  I  had 
nothing  to  offer  in  the  way  of  ministry.  After  meeting  we 
ascended  to  the  Oblong,  and  a  long  ascent  it  was,  to  the  summit 
of  the  hill,  called  Quaker  Hill  [on  the  New  York  side  of  the 
line].  We  had  a  very  large  meeting  at  a  commodious  house 
built  by  Friends  on  that  hill.  They  who  attended  were 
generally  professors  of  the  truth,  and  mostly  '  plain '  and  becom 
ing  in  their  outward  garb ;  yet,  alas !  when  they  came  to  be 
viewed  in  the  true  light  they  appeared  dry  and  formal,  many,  I 
fear,  having  clothed  corrupted  nature  with  a  form  of  religion, 
and  in  a  '  plain '  dress  sit  in  their  religious  meetings  like  dead 
images. 

"We  had  a  large  meeting  at  the  Nine  Partners  [East  of 
Poughkeepsie]  and  we  had  a  painful  afflicting  meeting  at 
Oswego.  On  First  day,  the  xoth  of  Eighth  month,  we  were  at  the 
Oblong  meeting  again ;  my  travail  through  the  entire  meeting 
was  in  suffering  silence.  We  had  meetings  [travelling  south]  at 
Peach-Pond,  North  Castle,  Purchase,  Mamarineck,  and  West 
Chester.  On  Firstday  the  i  yth  we  were  at  two  meetings  in  the 
city  of  New  York.  I  had  a  good  deal  of  satisfaction  among 
Friends  in  this  city,  and  I  hope  there  is  a  growth  in  best  things.""* 

Our  next  chapter  will  show  this  Quakerism  of  New 
York  more  from  the  inside,  and  we  shall  see  what  it 
was  as  its  own  records  reveal  its  activities.  The  material 
for  the  present  chapter  has  been  drawn  almost  entirely 
from  outside  sources,  especially  from  Public  Records  and 
the  Journals  of  visiting  ministers. 

We  have  seen  these  little  societies  of  Friends  spring 
up  and  grow  in  the  towns  of  Long  Island,  in  New  York 

1  Journal  of  John  Griffith  (London,  1779),  p.  393. 
8  Ibid.  pp.  408-411. 


CH.  i  QUAKERISM  IN   NEW  YORK  241 

City,  and  northward  along  the  chain  of  hills  back  of  the 
Hudson.  We  have  seen  them  confronted,  first  by  the 
fierce  hostility  of  an  established  religion  ;  next  by  the 
more  subtle  danger  of  Ranterism,  which  picked  off  the 
fringe  of  less  stable  members  ;  and,  finally,  we  have  seen 
these  groups  facing  the  subtlest  of  all  enemies  to  religion, 
the  tendency  to  cool  off,  stagnate,  and  become  the 
crystallised  reproduction  of  an  ancestral  faith.  There  was, 
however,  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  the  period  a 
real  spring  of  vitality  which  will  appear  more  clearly  in 
the  next  chapter.  Their  own  estimate  of  their  condition, 
made  in  1680,  is  on  the  whole  sound  and  true : 

"Through  patience  and  quietness,"  the  New  York  Friends 
wrote  to  London  Yearly  Meeting,  "we  have  overcome  in  and 
through  the  Lamb,  and  we  have  found  of  a  truth  that  the  Lord 
takes  care  of  his  people.  Our  testimonies  go  forth  without  any 
hindrance  and  return  unto  us  not  wholly  empty,  but  have  their 
fruitful  workings  both  upon  Dutch  and  English  nations.  In  a 
sense  of  this  our  hearts  rejoice  in  the  Lord  for  that  His  holy  light 
of  life  breaketh  through  the  darkness  as  the  dawning  of  the  day." 

There  is  nothing  better  in  this  world  of  ours  than  a 
people  living  in  and  practising  the  faith  that  the  holy 
light  of  life  is  breaking  through  the  darkness  as  the  dawn 
ing  of  the  day ! 


CHAPTER    II 

NEW   YORK   QUAKERISM — ITS    MEETINGS   AND 
ACTIVITIES 

THE  external  husk  of  any  religious  movement  is  obvious 
and  describable,  the  inner  core  is  indescribable,  and  is 
missed  by  all  except  those  who  are  initiated.  The  garb 
and  language,  the  external  peculiarities,  and  the  odd  "  testi 
monies  "  of  the  Colonial  Quakers  struck  most  observers. 
The  novel  experience,  the  fresh  sense  of  God  which  had 
come  to  them,  was  what  the  casual  onlooker  failed  to 
understand,  and  yet  this  was  in  reality  the  only  thing 
that  mattered — it  was  the  inner  core. 

The  meeting  for  worship  which  was  held  for  the  very 
purpose  of  cultivating  this  fresh  sense  of  God  was  thus 
the  heart  of  the  whole  Quaker  system.  All  religions 
which  move  men  profoundly  and  make  them  able  to 
endure  the  world's  crucifixions  have  some  method  of 
bringing  God  and  man  together  in  a  face  to  face  experi 
ence.  The  Quaker  method  was  extremely  simple,  but,  at 
its  best,  powerfully  effective.  It  called  for  no  material 
apparatus  and  it  made  use  of  no  sacred  symbols.  It 
consisted  alone  of  the  hushing  of  the  noise  and  din  of  the 
outer  activities  of  life.  Its  supreme  and  central  axiom 
was  the  faith  that  God  is  Spirit  amd  so  as  near  the  human 
spirit  as  air  is  to  the  breathing  lungs  or  sunlight  to  the 
living  plant.  But  as  this  spiritual  relationship  is  a  personal 
matter  it  calls  for  a  peculiar  attitude  of  will,  or,  in  the 
language  of  an  earlier  time,  a  certain  condition  of  heart. 
God,  the  Quaker  assumed,  did  not  need  to  be  brought 
nearer ;  man  alone  needed  to  be  adjusted  and  made 

242 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  243 

appreciative.  He  could  no  more  find  God  when  he  was 
full  of  himself  and  of  the  world,  than  one  can  enjoy 
beautiful  music  with  his  mind  crowded  with  the  whirr 
of  factory  wheels.  He  must  be  hushed  and  attuned. 
Just  this  hushing  and  attuning  was  the  service  of  the 
meeting  for  worship.  Those  who  formed  the  nucleus  of 
the  Quaker  group  were  thoroughly  tired  of  theological 
arguments  and  of  sermons  which  began  and  ended  on  the 
level  of  logic — or  "  knowledge  about."  They  wanted  a 
new  approach.  They  were  eager  for  a  direct  "  knowledge 
of  acquaintance  " — an  experience  which  made  their  hearts 
burn  with  a  sense  of  the  Divine  Presence,  and  they  found 
this  in  the  meeting  for  worship. 

We  know  to-day  much  more  than  they  did  of  the 
psychology  of  corporate  silence,  and  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  there  is  a  "  borderland  "  state  of  consciousness 
produced  by  unbroken  silence  in  which  the  deepest 
strata  of  the  self  come  into  function  in  ways  not  usual 
to  the  normal  consciousness.  If  it  is  true,  as  I  believe, 
that  the  Divine  and  the  human  are  conjunct,  then  it  is 
further  true  that  the  corporate  silence  is  an  admirable 
preparation  for  spiritual  correspondence.  But,  in  any 
case,  it  is  beyond  question  that  these  meetings  for 
worship  made  those  who  participated  in  them  feel  sure 
that  they  had  been  meeting  and  communing  with  God, 
and  they  were,  therefore,  very  dynamic  occasions,  and  the 
members  believed  that  they  had  found,  in  the  hard 
surroundings  of  pioneer  life,  a  real  "  upper  room  "  religion. 

In  its  earliest  stage  on  Long  Island,  as  everywhere 
else  in  the  colonies,  Quakerism  was  primarily  a  method  of 
worship.  Its  organisation  was  very  slight  indeed.  Those 
who  found  a  new  life  in  the  meetings  for  worship  risked 
reputation,  goods,  and  life  to  go  to  them,  and,  in  doing  so, 
they  were  thereby  Quakers.  Certain  marked  habits,  which 
had  almost  unconsciously  formed  in  the  Quaker  groups, 
would  naturally  be  quickly  taken  up,  such  as  the  use  of 
"thou  and  thee"  in  speech,  the  refusal  to  conform  to 
fashion  in  dress,  the  scruple  about  oaths,  and  the  care  to 
avoid  everything  that  had  to  do  with  war.  There  formed, 


244   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

too,  gradually  of  course,  a  certain  disposition,  or  mental 
"  atmosphere,"  which  characterised  a  Quaker  of  the  inner 
circle  as  much  as  his  dress  or  speech  did.  Its  leading 
feature  was  a  bloom  of  joy  which  came  into  the  life  with 
assurance  of  salvation  and  confidence  in  the  love  of  God. 
There  were,  no  doubt,  Quakers  of  hard  faith  and  stern 
face,  but  the  tone  of  character  which  goes  with  conscious 
ness  of  fellowship  with  God  was  the  usual  mark. 

Little  by  little,  here  as  in  the  other  colonies,  the 
organisation  took  on  shape  and  grew  defined.  The 
influence  of  George  Fox  upon  the  formation  of  the 
colonial  meetings  in  the  early  period  is  everywhere  clearly 
evident,  and  the  earliest  Records  generally  open  with  an 
epistle  from  him.  The  earliest  minute  in  the  New  York 
Records  runs : 

"At  a  men's  Meet  ye  23  day  of  3d  month  1671.  It  was 
agreed  yt  ye  first  dayes  Meetings  be  on  one  day  at  Oyster  bay 
and  another  day  at  Matinacock ;  and  ye  weekly  Meeting  to  begin 
about  ye  first  houre  in  ye  afternoon.  It  was  allso  agreed  ther 
shall  bee  a  Meeting  keept  at  the  wood  edge  [Westbury]  the  25 
of  the  4th  month  and  soe  every  5th  first  Day  of  the  week." l 

This  is  the  earliest  extant  minute  of  a  Friends' 
meeting  in  America  and  is  probably  the  earliest  one 
written  on  the  continent.  John  Burnyeat  who  attended 
this  meeting  in  1671  brought  with  him  a  minute-book 
which  George  Fox  had  sent  to  Long  Island  Friends  by 
his  hand.  The  above  minute  is  followed  by  a  letter  of 
advice  from  George  Fox  which  begins  with  his  usual 
salutation,  "  In  the  Truth  of  God  which  changes  not 
in  whom  is  my  love."  He  then  reminds  his  distant 
Friends  that  "  there  hath  been  [among  them]  a  stoppage 
of  ye  truth  and  power  of  God,"  and  that  they  need  to 
be  "  searched  to  ye  bottom "  and  so  "  come  into  ye 
sanctified  life"  —  and  for  this  purpose  he  calls  for  a 
careful  examination  of  the  persons  who  claim  to  be 
Friends,  and  a  winnowing  of  those  who  walk  unworthily 

1  This  Book  of  Minutes  was  discovered  in  a  garret  at  Flushing  in  1868  and  is 
in  the  vault  in  the  Meeting  House  at  Rutherford  Place,  New  York,  John  Cox, 
junior,  custodian. 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  245 

and  are  in  "  the  rotten  principle  of  ye  ranters."  He 
urges  further  a  careful  collection  of  the  list  of  sufferings 
endured  in  "the  plantation."  From  this  time  on,  the 
organisation,  for  purposes  of  order  and  for  purposes  of 
relief,  gradually  progressed.1 

There  is  an  interesting  link  of  connection  between  the 
Long  Island  Friends  and  those  in  New  England  to  be 
found  in  an  epistle  of  Advice  from  the  latter  to  the  former 
in  1679  : 

"  Dear  friends,  ye  know  that  the  Lord  God  of  heaven  hath 
appeared  and  manifested  His  mighty  power  which  hath  reached 
unto  thousands  and  hath  redeemed  many  out  of  nations,  tongues, 
kindreds,  and  peoples  to  be  a  peculiar  people,  and  hath  taught  us 
by  His  holy  Spirit  to  denie  ye  customs,  fashions  and  words  of  ye 
world.  ...  It  lieth  upon  us,  ye  people  of  God  assembled 
together  at  ye  Men  and  Women's  Meeting  in  Road  Island,  to 
stir  up  ye  minds  in  one  another  that  ye  principles  of  ye  blessed 
truth  be  allwaise  stood  in  and  continued  for  that  God  over  all 
may  be  honoured  and  his  people  preserved  in  purity  and  good 
order  in  ye  truth  that  changeth  not,  that  soe  they  may  be 
preachers  of  Righteousness  unto  ye  world  in  their  words  and 
actions." 

The  "  Advice "  which  follows  this  salutation  is  an 
interesting  revelation  of  the  things  which  seemed  to  the 
early  Friend  of  greatest  moment  No  Friend  is  to  "  walk 
disorderly  in  anything "  ;  nor  to  live  in  any  way  "  not 
according  to  Truth " ;  "  nor  to  oppress  or  defraud  any 
man  in  his  dealings " ;  no  one  is  to  "  weare  needless 
attire "  and  all  Friends  are  to  "  indever  to  bring  up 
their  children  to  use  plaine  language  and  weare  plaine 
and  deasent  cloathing  and  demeane  them  in  all  things 
according  to  ye  truth  which  we  make  profession  of."  2 

At  this  earliest  stage  the  records  do  not  sharply  mark 
off  one  type  of  meeting  from  another — "  a  men's  meeting  " 

1  John  Bowne,  John  Tilton,  Samuel  Spicer,  and  Samuel  Andrews,  who  were  in 
the  list  of  Friends  addressed  in  the  Epistle,  were  the  leaders  in  the  group  of  Long 
Island  Quakers.     John  Feake,  Hugh  Cowperthwait  and  Anthonie  Wright  may 
also  be  mentioned  among  those  of  largest  influence. 

2  "Given  forth   at   a  Generall   Man   and   Women's    Meeting    at   William 
Coddington's   at    Road   Island  ye  I2th  of  ye  4lh  mo.    1679." — First  Book  of 
Records  of  Flushing  Monthly  Meeting. 


246  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

may  be  a  "  monthly  meeting,"  or  a  "  quarterly  meeting,"  or 
a  "  half-years  meeting."  Little  by  little,  however,  two 
types  did  differentiate,  and  there  were  formed  Flushing 
Monthly  Meeting  and  Westbury  Quarterly  Meeting  which 
in  the  spring  and  autumn  sessions  was  frequently  called, 
though  not  officially,  "  Oysterbay  Half  Years  Meeting  " — 
all  of  which  "  belonged  "  to  New  England  Yearly  Meeting 
until  1696,  when  New  York  Yearly  Meeting  was  estab 
lished  as  an  independent  body.1 

The  two  Monthly  Meetings  composing  Westbury 
Quarterly  Meeting  appear  to  have  been  established,  and 
regularly  held  by  the  year  1682,  as  the  following  minutes 
of  the  Quarterly  Meeting  held  in  6th  month  1682 
indicate  : 

"  Ffriends  of  ye  Monthly  Meeting  of  New  York  and  Gravesend 
[Flushing  Monthly  Meeting]  doe  agree  yt  ye  Monthly  Meeting  is 
to  be  keept  at  Yorke  two  months  following  &  ye  jd  at  Gravesend, 
the  first  Meeting  at  Gravesend  to  be  YE  FIRST  FOURTH  day  in 
the  6th  mo.  &  soe  sucksesifly." 

"  Friends  at  this  Meeting  hath  left  unto  ye  consideration  of 


1  It  was  set  off  from  New  England  Yearly  Meeting  by  the  following  minute  : 

"  At  a  Generall  Yearly  Meeting  at  ye  house  of  Walter  Newberry's  in  Road  Island 
ye  i4th  daye  of  ye  4th  mo.  1695.  ...  It  is  Agreed  yt  [that]  ye  Meeting  at  Long 
Island  Shall  Bee  from  this  time  a  Yearly  Meeting  and  yt  John  Bowne  and  John 
Rodman  shall  take  care  to  Receive  such  papers  as  shall  come  to  ye  Yearly 
Meeting  in  Long  Island  and  Corespond  with  Friends  Appoynted  in  London.  ..." 
The  first  session  was  on  3rd  month  [May]  29,  1696,  and  it  has  met  every  year 
since  in  the  latter  part  of  the  same  month. 

"At  the  Yearly  Meeting  at  our  Meeting  house  in  flushing  ye  3oth  ye  3d  mo. 
1696  Henry  Willis  and  Hen  Coperthwaite  are  by  this  Meeting  desired  to  get  a 
release  for  ye  title  of  our  Meeting  house  and  Land  belonging  and  bring  it  to  our 
next  Meeting." 

This  was  the  first  session  of  what  is  now  called  New  York  Yearly  Meeting. 
It  was  then  generally  called  the  Yearly  Meeting  held  at  Flushing. 

By  the  following  minutes  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  it  appears  that  Westbury 
Quarterly  Meeting  was  held  three  times  in  the  year  and  that  the  Yearly  Meeting 
took  its  place  in  the  fourth  quarter. 

' '  Whereas  this  Meeting  is  now  Concluded  to  be  a  Yearly  Meeting  and  not  a 
Quarterly  one  it  is  Thought  Proper  that  the  order  of  the  state  of  Meetings  or 
anything  else  from  the  Monthly  Meetings  of  Flushing  and  Westbury  be  first 
carryed  into  the  Quarterly  Meeting  at  Westbury  in  the  Twelfth  Month  and  from 
thence  Recommended  unto  this  Meeting  until  Friends  see  cause  to  order  it 
otherways. " 

Westbury  Quarterly  Meeting  was  composed  of  two  Monthly  Meetings : 
Flushing  Monthly  Meeting  (later  called  New  York),  and  Westbury  Monthly 
Meeting,  established  in  1682  and  held  at  Oyster  Bay,  Matinecock,  Hempstead,  and 
Jericho. 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  247 

Friends  at  ye  Monthly  Meeting  at  Oyster  bay  ye  sattling  of  ye 
Meeting  of  Friends  at  ye  farms  &  at  woodedg  whether  it  be 
conventient  or  not  for  them  to  be  in  two  settled  Meetings  or  not." 

The  "  farms "  was  the  early  name  of  Jericho  and 
"  Wood  edge  "  was  Westbury. 

The  following  Minute  settles  still  more  definitely  the 
jurisdiction  of  Flushing  Monthly  Meeting : 

"The  2oth  day  of  ye  3d  mo.  1684  :  Then  agreed  by  Friends 
at  this  Meeting  yt  ffriends  at  Yorke,  Gravesend,  and  Flushing 
and  Westchester,  ye  Kills,  and  Newton  doe  all  belong  unto  one 
Monthly  Meeting  to  remain  at  Gravesend  at  ye  4th  mo. 
Quarterly  Meeting  and  soe  to  continue  by  their  own  appointing 
wt  place  they  see  convenient  after." 

It  was  always  held  at  Flushing  from  1695  till  8  mo. 
6,  1742  then  Flushing  and  Newtown  until  6  mo.  1st, 
1768  then  Flushing,  Newtown,  and  New  York  until 
II  mo.  i,  1780,  after  which  it  was  not  held  at  Newtown. 
The  name  was  changed  to  the  Monthly  Meeting  of  Friends 
of  New  York  7  mo.  I,  1795. 

The  plan  for  the  holding  of  the  Quarterly  Meeting  was 
marked  out  as  follows  in  1686  : 

"  At  our  Quarterly  Meeting  at  Jericho  on  Long  Island  this 
27th  day  of  ye  12  mo.  1685-6  :  By  Joynt  Consent  of  said  men 
and  women's  Meeting  for  regulating  our  Quarterly  Meeting  for 
most  Conveniency  it  is  thought  fitt  and  Vnanimously  Agreed  for 
the  futur  ye  said  Meetings  shall  be  at  such  times  and  places  as 
here  Vnder  Nominated. 

"  Vizt :  Att  Flushing  a  Quarterly  Meeeting  the  last  first  day 
of  the  third  month.  Att  Oyster  Bay  the  last  7th  and  ist  day  of 
the  Sixth  month.  Att  Flushing  the  last  7th  and  ist  day  of  the 
ninth  month.  Att  Jericho  the  last  7th  and  ist  day  of  ye  12 
mo.  Att  Westchester  a  Yearly  Meeting  for  worship  the  last  first 
day  in  ye  4  mo.  Att  ye  Kills  the  last  first  day  of  the  5  mo. 
Att  Jameca  ye  last  first  day  of  ye  7  mo." l 

The  important  "  business "  of  all  these  meetings  in 
their  primitive  period  was  (i)  dealing  with  persons  who 
got  entangled  in  "  the  ranting  spirit "  which  swept  Long 
Island  in  the  'seventies  and  to  the  end  of  the  century  ; 

1  Quarterly  Meeting  Records. 


248    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES    BK.  u 

(2)  guarding  the  high  moral  standard  which  the  Friends 
had  set  themselves  to  maintain,  and  (3)  preserving  the 
peculiar  Quaker  "  testimonies." 

A  specimen  minute  under  each  of  these  heads  will 
indicate  how  these  internal  problems  were  met.  The  first 
is  a  minute  concerning  a  certain  Thomas  Phillips  who 
had  developed  "  a  ranting  spirit "  : 

"And  now,  dear  friends,  this  may  let  you  understand  yt  a 
few  months  since  there  arrived  at  this  island  one  Thomas 
Phillips  who  as  he  sd  was  formerly  a  liver  at  Oyster  Bay,  he 
being  a  hatter  by  trade,  who  when  he  was  here  in  sum  small 
time  sought  to  thrust  himself  amongst  Friends,  he  being  as  we 
afterwards  perceived  in  need  of  money.  But  some  of  ye  Friends 
wth  whome  he  first  came  acquainted  not  liking  his  discourse,  he 
setting  up  ye  Ranting  Spirit  and  its  followers  who  goe  vnder  ye 
name  of  new  friends,  a  Friend  now  living  in  this  Island  (by  name 
John  Brown  who  formerly  was  banished  to  some  of  those  parts 
and  had  some  knowledge  of  those  people)  did  desire  to  speak 
with  him  believing  that  he  was  one  of  them  in  their  spirit  wch. 
he  in  five  words  persaued  soe,  and  warned  him  to  come  out  of 
it.  But  he  still  frequented  our  Meetings  and  growing  more 
subtil  and  crafty,  did  frequently  in  company  of  some  weak 
Friends,  as  their  manner  is,  beguile  them." 

He  was  finally  induced  to  "  give  forth  a  paper,"  con 
demning  his  errors,  "  but  it  was  much  too  short  in  several 
respects,"  and  so  did  not  satisfy  the  Monthly  Meeting, 
which  proceeded  to  give  its  testimony  against  all  "  dis 
orderly  ways  "  of  life,  and  a  call  to  its  members  to  "  walk 
in  the  everlasting  way  of  holiness — the  King's  highway — 
and  to  be  kept  by  the  Lord  alwaise  of  sound  judgment 
and  right  understanding  in  things  that  are  of  greatest 
weight  and  concernment."  * 

The  way  Friends  followed  up  the  doings  of  their 
members  and  scrutinised  their  reputations  is  well  illustrated 
by  this  Minute  sent  from  Westbury  Quarterly  Meeting  to 
Friends  in  the  Island  of  Jamaica  : 

"  ffrom  our  Quarterly  Meeting  at  Flushing  ye  3oth  day  of  ye 
6th  mo.  1678:  We  having  been  informed  at  this  Meeting  by 

1  First  Book  of  Records  under  date  5th  mo.  29,  1680. 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  249 

our  friend  Rob.  Story  yt  one  John  Inyon,  a  marchant  in  New 
York,  exclaimed  against  Friends  after  this  manner :  saying  the 
greatest  cheats  in  the  world  goe  under  the  name  of  Quakers. 
His  reason  being  demanded  he  said  he  consigned  a  vessell  to 
one  William  Shattlewood  and  to  another  man  in  Jemica  which 
he  called  Quakers,  and  he  saith  they  will  give  him  no  account 
of  his  concerns  [consignments].  These  are  to  desire  Friends  to 
examine  ye  matter  and  write  to  us,  if  any  Friends  have  received 
anythings  we  would  have  them  give  an  account  how  disposed  of, 
that  we  may  have  something  to  answer  him.  These  with  our 
deare  love." l 

Dorothy  Farrington's  "  case  "  is  an  illustration  of  the 
third  type  of  "  business  "  : 

"The  8th  of  ye  loth  mo.  1676:  At  a  men  and  women 
Meeting  in  ye  house  of  Matthew  Prior  at  Killingworth  [later 
called  Matinecock]  it  was  agreed  on  in  ye  Meeting  that  such 
as  could  find  anything  upon  them  shall  go  vnto  Dorety 
ffarington  of  flushing  and  speake  unto  her  in  love  and  in  ye 
meekness  to  know  whether  she  will  owne  judgment  for  her 
walking  and  acting  contrary  unto  ye  truth  in  taking  a  husband 
of  ye  world  and  not  in  unity  of  Friends."  2 

There  is  a  very  fine  early  minute  explaining  to  the 
Governor  of  the  Colony  why  Friends  cannot  help  build 
the  fort  in  New  York  harbour,  and  this  minute  well 
presents  the  way  in  which  the  Friends  put  their  testi 
monies  before  those  in  authority : 

"To  ye  Gouernor  of  New  Yorke. 

"  Whereas  it  was  desired  of  ye  country  that  all  who  would 
willingly  contribute  towards  repairing  ye  fort  of  New  Yorke 

1  First  Book  of  Records  under  date  6th  mo.  30,  1678. 

2  First  Book  of  Records.     A  bill  concerning   marriages  was  passed  by  the 
Legislature  in  1684  which  provided  that   "nothing  in  this  Act  Shall  be  Con 
strued  or  intended  to  prejudice  the  Custome  and  manner  of  marriages  amongst 
the  Quakers,  but  their  manner  and  forme  of  marriages  shall  be  judged  Lawful ;  pro 
vided  they  Admitt  of  none  to  marry  that  are  restrained  by  the  law  of  God  contained 
in  the  five  books  of  Moses." 

Here  is  a  humble  apology  from  Daniel  Lawrence  which  is  quite  of  the 
common  type:  "  To  the  Monthly  Meeting  at  Flushing  ye  3rd  5th  mo.  1716. 
Friends  in  as  much  as  I  have  made  profession  of  ye  Blessed  truth  with  you  which 
would  preserued  and  kept  me  out  of  the  many  Euils  that  are  in  the  world  but  I 
must  say  that  with  sorrow  of  hart  I  haue  giuen  way  to  An  ary  Spirit  and  too  much 
joyning  myself  in  fellowship  with  men  of  libertine  spirits  and  alsoe  in  that  insuit- 
able  frame  of  minde  made  sute  upon  account  of  marriage  with  one  that  was  not 
a  Friend  or  Friend's  child  the  which  actions  I  doe  with  censerity  condemn  and 
hoop  for  time  to  come  to  be  more  carefull  and  sircumspect  so  1  shall  subscribe 
myself  your  friend  who  desires  to  doe  well  and  hue  in  vnity  with  friends  for  time 
to  come.  DANIEL  LAWRENCK." 


250   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

would  give  in  their  names  and  summes ;  and  we  whose  names 
are  under  written  not  being  found  on  the  list.  It  was  since 
desired  by  ye  High  Sheriff  yt  we  would  giue  our  reasons  unto 
ye  Gouernor  how  willing  and  ready  we  have  been  to  pay  our 
customs  as  County  raytes  and  needful  towne  charges  and  how 
we  haue  behaued  our  Selues  Peaceibly  and  quietly  Amongst  our 
Neighbours  ;  and  are  ready  to  be  seruisable  in  anything  which 
doth  not  Infringe  upon  our  tender  consciences  but  being  in 
measure  Redeemed  of  warres  and  stripes  we  cannot  for  conscience' 
sake  be  concerned  in  vpholding  things  of  yt  nature  as  you  your 
selves  well  know.  It  hath  not  not  been  our  practice  in  Old 
England  since  we  were  a  people ;  and  this  in  meekness  we 
declare.  In  behalfe  of  ourselves  and  our  ffriends,  loue  and  good 
will  vnto  thee  and  all  men. 

JOHN  TILTON.  SAML.  ANDREWS. 

JOHN  BOWNE.  MATT.  PRYER. 

SAML.  SPICER.  JOHN  VNDERHILL. 

JOHN  RICHARDSON.     JOHN  FEKE. 
"Slushing  ye  3oth  of  ye  loth  month  1672." 

Westbury  Quarterly  Meeting  was  the  only  quarterly 
meeting  in  the  colony  until  the  year  1745,  when  Purchase 
Quarterly  Meeting  (often  called  "  Oblong  Quarterly 
Meeting  "  and  sometimes  "  the  Quarterly  Meeting  on  the 
Main ")  was  established.  It  was  the  only  quarterly 
meeting  "  on  the  main "  within  the  period  of  this 
history.1  It  was  composed  of  Purchase  Monthly 
Meeting  and  Oblong  Monthly  Meeting.  Purchase 
Monthly  Meeting  was  established  June  9,  1725,  and 
was  the  first  monthly  meeting  "  on  the  main  " — the  third 
in  the  Province — and  was  in  its  early  period  generally 
called  the  "  Monthly  Meeting  for  Westchester." 2  Oblong 

1  Nine  Partners  Quarterly  Meeting  was  established  nth  month,  i3th,  1783. 

2  The  opening  Minute  reads  as  follows  : — 

"Whereas  our  last  Yearly  Meeting  at  Flushing  did  consent  and  appoint  a 
Mounthly  Meeting  to  be  held  at  Westchester  for  this  county  of  Westchester, 
accordingly  we  are  met  to  hold  our  Mounthly  Meeting  this  gth  day,  4th  month, 
1725.  Being  present  the  most  part  of  Friends  of  Westchester,  of  Mamreneck 
and  Rye. " 

It  would  seem  to  have  been  generally  held  at  the  Meeting-house  at  Westchester 
till  7th  month  12,  1728,  then  "at  the  house  of  Josiah  Quinby"  at  Mamaroneck 
till  roth  month  n,  1739,  when  the  meeting-house  was  built  in  Mamaroneck. 
It  was  held  for  the  first  time  at  Purchase  in  3rd  month  1742,  and  thereafter 
for  some  years  twice  at  Mamaroneck  and  once  at  Purchase,  preceding  each 
Quarterly  Meeting,  and  later  was  held  every  other  time  at  Chappaqua  till  that 
was  set  off  as  a  separate  Monthly  Meeting  in  1785. 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND   ACTIVITIES  251 

Monthly  Meeting  was  set  off  from  Purchase  Monthly 
Meeting,  and  was  established  in  1744.  In  1769  a 
monthly  meeting  was  set  off  from  Oblong  and  established 
as  "Nine  Partners  Monthly  Meeting,"  and  in  1778 
Saratoga  Monthly  Meeting  (later  called  Easton)  was 
established,  which  brings  us  to  the  end  of  the  period 
covered  in  this  volume."  l 

1  For  exhibiting  to  the  reader  the  localities  in  which  Quakerism  took  root  I  add 
a  list  of  the  local,  or  "  Preparative,"  meetings  established  up  to  the  year  1780  : — 

FLUSHING  MEETING  dates  from  1657,  though  it  was  perhaps  not  a  regular 
congregational  meeting  until  1662. 

WESTBURY  MEETING  (first  called  the  Meeting  at  Woodedge)  goes  back  into 
the  'sixties  though  the  first  official  mention  is  4th  month  25,  1671. 

MATINECOCK  MEETING  was  probably  a  regular  congregational  meeting  in 
the  'sixties,  though  the  first  mention  on  the  Records  is  1671. 

JERICHO  MEETING  (in  the  earliest  accounts  called  the  "Farms  Meeting") 
dates  also  from  the  'sixties. 

Cow  NECK  MEETING  also  has  a  long  period  without  official  Records,  but  is 
first  officially  named  in  1702. 

NEW  YORK  CITY  MEETING  cannot  be  definitely  dated,  but  is  first  officially 
settled  in  1681. 

NEWTOWN  MEETING  (sometimes  called  "  the  Kills,"  and  sometimes  Maspeth) 
has  a  long  unrecorded  period,  but  is  first  officially  named  in  1682. 

WESTCHESTER  MEETING  goes  back  to  1684,  but  was  officially  established 
as  a  Preparative  Meeting  in  1716. 

MAMARONECK  MEETING  established  as  a  meeting  for  worship  1711,  as  a 
Preparative  Meeting  in  1728. 

PURCHASE  MEETING,  originally  part  of  Westchester  Meeting,  but  made  an 
independent  Preparative  Meeting  in  1742. 

OBLONG  PREPARATIVE  MEETING  established  1742. 

CHAPPAQUA  MEETING  was  allowed  in  1745,  and  a  few  years  later  was  made 
a  Preparative  Meeting. 

NINE  PARTNERS  MEETING  (Meeting  for  worship  first  called  "Crumelbow" 
in  1742)  established  a  Preparative  Meeting  in  1744. 

NEW  MILFORD  MEETING  (a  meeting  for  worship  probably  as  early  as  1733) 
established  as  Preparative  Meeting  in  1777. 

OSWEGO  PREPARATIVE  MEETING  established  1758. 

PEACH  POND  MEETING  (a  meeting  for  worship  as  early  as  1760)  established 
a  Preparative  Meeting  in  1779. 

POUGHQUAIG  (sometimes  spelled  "  Appoughquage  "  and  sometimes  "  Poquage" 
was  a  meeting  for  worship  in  1771)  established  a  Preparative  Meeting  1773. 

EAST  HOOSAC  MEETING  (in  Western  Massachusetts)  was  begun  as  a  meeting 
for  worship  in  1774.  and  became  a  part  of  Saratoga  Monthly  Meeting  about 
1775.  It  was  established  a  Monthly  Meeting  in  1778. 

AMAWALK  MEETING  established  a  Preparative  Meeting  to  be  held  once  a 
quarter  in  1774 — a  meeting  for  worship  some  years  earlier,  probably  in  1766. 

CREEK  MEETING  established  as  a  Preparative  Meeting  of  NINE  PARTNERS 
Monthly  Meeting  in  1776 — a  meeting  for  worship  in  the  house  of  Jonathan  Hoag 
in  1771. 

SARATOGA  MEETING,  a  meeting  for  worship  in  1774,  a  Preparative  Meeting 
in  1776. 

CORNWALL  MEETING,  a  meeting  for  worship  in  1773 — a  Preparative  Meeting 
in  1777. 

MARLBOROUGH  MEETING,  a  meeting  for  worship  in  1776,  a  Preparative 
Meeting  in  1783. 


252    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

The  most  illuminating  glimpse  we  get  into  the  actual 
life  of  Quakerism  in  this  Colony  in  its  early  period  is 
offered  us  in  an  Epistle  which  these  Friends  sent  to 
London  Yearly  Meeting  in  1701.  There  is  no  "  doctrine  " 
in  it,  and  no  attempt  is  made  to  analyze  the  religious 
condition  of  the  Colony  but  a  brief  extract  will  show  that 
there  did  prevail  at  this  date  a  fairly  live  type  of 
Christianity  in  the  Quaker  group.  It  reads : 

"Dear  Friends  in  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ:  In  that  Love 
which  comes  from  God  and  in  which  we  are  united,  we  dearly 
salute  you  in  true  brotherly  kindness.  We  signify  unto  you  the 
prosperity  of  Truth  amongst  us  to  the  Joy  of  our  Souls.  The 
Lord  is  giving  an  increase  daily  to  Friends  and  many  are  added 
to  the  number  of  the  Lord's  people,  and  the  people  round  about 
where  Friends  dwell  increase  in  love  to  Friends  and  frequently 
come  to  Friends  meetings — especially  when  the  Lord  sends  His 
servants  [in  the  ministry]  to  visit  us.  We  pray  our  gracious  and 
merciful  God  that  we  may  walk  worthy  of  his  Love  and  that  the 
Lord  may  continue  his  tender  regard  to  us  in  sending  His 
servants  filled  with  His  power  and  wisdom.  The  government  is 
kind  to  Friends  and  we  enjoy  our  liberty." 1 

These  "  servants  of  God  filled  with  power  and  wisdom  " 
did  continue  to  come,  as  the  writers  of  this  Epistle  prayed, 
and  there  is  an  amazing  list  of  such  itinerant  ministers  on 
the  records  of  the  various  meetings.  In  fact  the  one 
weakness  which  comes  out  clearly  in  this  Epistle  is  the 
indication  of  the  poverty  of  the  native  ministry  and  the 
dependence  for  ministry  on  visitors  from  abroad.  There 
was  no  effort  whatever  made  to  develop  ministry  within 

BEDFORD  MEETING,  "allowed"  in  1777  by  PURCHASE  MONTHLY  MEETING 
"  for  Friends  who  live  remote  from  Amawalk. " 

There  were  also  "house"  meetings  "allowed"  at  the  following  places:  An 
"allowed  meeting"  at  Hempstead  every  five  weeks  beginning  in  1765;  at 
Huntington,  allowed  by  WESTBURY  MONTHLY  MEETING  in  1732  ;  at  Rockaway 
allowed  by  WESTBURY  MONTHLY  MEETING  in  1739 ;  at  Setauket  allowed  by 
WESTBURY  MONTHLY  MEETING  in  1762. 

3/3/1744.  —  "The  Monthly  Meeting  of  the  Oblong  desired  the  approba 
tion  of  this  Meeting  in  settling  a  Visitation.  Meeting  at  Salisbury  to  be  kept  at 
Joshua  White's  twice  in  a  year,  one  on  the  3d  day  of  the  week  before  ye 
Monthly  Meeting  at  ye  Nine  Partners  in  the  3d  month,  and  the  other  on  the 
3d  day  of  the  week  before  said  Monthly  Meeting  in  the  7th  month,  which  this 
Meeting  having  had  under  consideration  doth  approve  of."  (Minutes  of 
Purchase  Quarterly  Meeting. ) 

1  Yearly  Meeting  Records  for  1701. 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  253 

the  body.  It  was  looked  upon  as  something  wholly  in 
the  inscrutable  will  of  God,  who  conferred  or  withheld 
His  gifts  as  He  would.  This  ignoring  of  the  human 
element  was  one  of  the  most  costly  blunders  which 
Friends  made,  not  only  in  New  York  but  everywhere  else, 
and  there  is  no  question  that  the  sporadic  character  of  the 
ministry  was  a  forbidding  aspect  to  most  persons  outside 
the  membership.  An  attempt  was  made  in  a  feeble  way 
in  1 704  to  meet  this  condition  of  weakness. 

It  was  decided  by  action  of  the  Westbury  Quarterly 
Meeting,  November  25,  1704,  that  a  meeting  should  be 
held  every  three  months  for  "  all  who  minister  in  public 
speaking  in  meetings  for  worship "  and  that  "  faithful 
Friends  out  of  each  meeting  be  joined  with  them."  This 
came  to  be  called  "  the  meeting  for  ministering  Friends," 
and  was  primarily  designed  for  the  "  encouragement "  of 
the  development  of  gifts.  If  some  plan  had  here  been 
matured  for  the  cultivation  and  development  of  "  spiritual 
gifts"  the  story  of  Quakerism  would  have  been  very 
different.  But  the  policy  of  timidity  prevailed,  and  the 
meeting  of  ministers  gradually  and  somewhat  uncon 
sciously  became  the  guardian  of  "  soundness "  and  the 
defender  of  ancient  standards,  rather  than  the  nursery  of 
vital  ministry.  It  was  composed  naturally  of  those  who 
were  far  past  middle  life,  who  had  travelled  away  from 
the  enthusiasm  and  creative  power  of  youth,  and  who 
could  not  think  or  act  in  fresh  and  constructive  ways. 
The  result  was  that  "  the  meeting  of  ministering  Friends  " 
became  a  solid  force  for  the  status  quo,  and  did  little  or 
nothing  for  a  genuine  development  of  fresh  and  vital 
ministry.  Such  ministry  did  arise  occasionally  out  of  the 
meetings  themselves,  as  we  shall  see,  and  sometimes  a 
powerful  voice  appeared,  but  the  development  of  a  "  gift " 
was  not  because  of  the  preparation  made  for  its  develop 
ment,  but  rather  notwithstanding  the  obstacles  which 
existed.1  There  were,  it  is  true,  special  meetings  held  for 

1  I  find  considerable  evidence  that  "  the  meeting  of  ministering  Friends  "  was 
occupied  largely  with  checking  rather  than  encouraging.  There  are  many 
minutes  like  the  following  : 

"  At  a  Meeting  of  Ministering  ffriends  at  ye  house   of  Samuel  Bowne  in 


254   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  n 

"  youth,"  but  they  were  "  youth's  meetings  "  only  in  name, 
for  all  the  members  attended  them,  and  the  point  of 
difference  between  them  and  ordinary  meetings  seems 
to  have  been  that  the  youth  were  urged  to  "  be  faithful." 

Gifts  did,  however,  appear  and  develop  in  spite  of  the 
neglect  of  methods  to  cultivate  them.  In  1745  a  boy 
was  born  at  Cow  Neck  on  Long  Island  and  named  David 
Sands.  He  educated  himself,  studying  often  by  firelight, 
and  grew  up  a  diligent,  eager-minded,  spiritually-inclined 
youth.  As  he  was  entering  early  manhood  he  attended 
a  Friends'  Meeting  at  which  Samuel  Nottingham,  an 
English  minister,  spoke,  and  the  message  reached  his 
spirit  and  powerfully  impressed  him.  He  became  an 
attender  of  the  Quaker  Meetings  on  the  Island  and  later 
in  New  York  City,  and  found  in  them  what  his  spirit 
was  seriously  seeking — a  religion  which  seemed  to  him 
real.  He  soon  moved  to  the  country  and  joined  in 
membership  in  the  meeting  at  Nine  Partners,  where  he 
often  broke  the  silence  with  simple  messages.  His  words 
were  felt  by  the  little  group  of  Friends  with  whom  he 
belonged  to  be  full  of  life,  and  little  by  little,  as  he  obeyed 
his  Light,  his  power  to  interpret  the  spiritual  meaning  of 
life  enlarged.  By  the  time  he  had  reached  his  thirtieth 
year  he  was  recorded  a  minister,  and  almost  immediately 
began  his  remarkable  travels  through  New  England, 
expanding  the  sphere  of  Quakerism  wherever  he  went. 
Later  he  travelled  extensively  in  Great  Britain  and  on  the 

(flushing  z8th  9  mo.  1712,  ffriends  at  this  meeting,  having  wayed  ye  inconvenience 
of  some  coming  amonge  us  from  other  parts  without  certificates  and  appearing  in 
publick  to  preach,  hath  appointed  John  Rider  and  Robert  Heald  out  of  (flushing 
Meeting,  and  William  Willis  and  Henry  Cock  out  of  Westbury  Monthly  Meeting, 
to  inquire  of  all  such  for  a  certificate  as  they  shall  think  need  may  Require." 

"  At  a  meeting  of  Ministering  ffriends  held  at  ye  house  of  ye  Widdow  Willis'es 
at  Jereco,  Robert  Heald  Declared  at  this  meeting  that  he  was  sorry  and  Troubled 
for  his  accompanying  his  sister  Charety  Willet  in  going  home  with  her  to  her 
new  Dwelling  She  being  married  the  day  before  out  of  ye  unity  of  ffriends  ;  ye 
said  Robert  declaring  his  sense  of  it  was  not  well,  with  wch  ye  Meeting  was 
satisfied." 

' '  firom  our  Meeting  of  Ministering  ffriends  and  Elders  ye  2510  of  ye  3  mo. 
1728  at  the  Meeting  house  in  fflushing,  this  Meeting  having  considered  this 
complaint  that  hath  been  made  from  Westchester  County  of  Richard  Rogers 
appearing  in  publick  preaching  in  their  said  Publick  Meetings  to  their  Grief. 
This  Meeting  hath  advised  him  by  this  present  Instrument  to  forbear  for  the  time 
to  com  so  to  appeare  in  Publick  until  ffriends  have  unity." 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  255 

Continent  of  Europe,  speaking  under  diverse  and  often 
difficult  circumstances  with  much  penetration  and  insight, 
and  exhibiting  a  very  simple  and  genuine  life  of  real 
religious  experience.  The  few  glimpses  that  are  given  in 
his  Memoirs  of  his  interpretation  of  inward  religion  show 
that  he  had  a  sure  grasp  of  the  seed-principle  of  the 
founders  of  Quakerism.  He  says  that  though  we  live 
far  separated  in  time  from  the  miracles  of  the  apostolic 
period,  we  lack  in  no  sense  a  convincing  evidence  of  the 
divine  character  of  Christianity,  since  there  is  an  internal 
testimony  to  the  Gospel  of  Christ  in  the  heart  of  every  one 
that  receives  it — the  Spirit  of  God  witnesseth  with  our 
Spirits,  the  changed  heart  becomes  the  house  of  God, 
revelation  proves  to  be  a  present  and  continuous  fact,  and 
the  soul  has  its  own  altar  within.1 

This  case  of  the  normal  and  effective  spiritual  develop 
ment  of  David  Sands  is  by  no  means  an  isolated  case ; 
such  instances  of  the  blowing  of  the  Spirit  as  it  listed  are 
fairly  frequent,  but  the  fact  remains  that  David  Sands 
himself  was,  throughout  his  life,  hampered  by  the  way  in 
which  his  human  development  was  neglected,  and  by  the 
lack  of  adequate  method  ior  the  cultivation  of  what  in  his 
case  was  a  very  remarkable  gift. 

If  the  Friends  did  not  always  handle  their  internal 
affairs  with  what  seems  to  us  at  this  far  date  to  have 
been  "wisdom,"  they  had,  at  any  rate,  a  sure  insight 
when  they  attacked  moral  issues.  The  most  massive 
moral  problem,  here,  as  in  the  other  colonies,  was  slavery, 
and  as  soon  as  the  evils  of  the  system  impressed  the 
consciousness  of  Friends  they  grappled  manfully  with  the 
issue — first  clearing  their  own  skirts  and  then  endeavour 
ing  to  cleanse  the  country  itself.  The  awakening  to  a 
consciousness  of  the  evil  did  not  come  until  after  the 
middle  of  the  eighteenth  century.2  The  "  awakening  " 
was  almost  certainly  due  to  the  visit  of  John  Woolman — 
a  "  beloved  disciple "  of  liberty  whose  conscience  was  as 

1  Memoirs  of  David  Sands  (1745-1818),  London,  1848. 

2  The  Half  Year's  Meeting  on  Long  Island,  I4th  October  1684,  appointed 
John  Bowne  and  Wm.  Richardf/on  to  raise  money  "on  cheap  terms"  to  supply 
to  John  Adams  ' '  part  payment  for  a  Negro  man  that  he  hath  lately  bought. " 


256   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  a 

sensitive  to  social  evils  as  mercury  is  to  temperature. 
He  travelled  among  the  Friends  of  New  York  Colony  in 
1 760,  and  there  came  a  powerful  moral  uprising  against 
the  evil  of  slave-holding  almost  directly  after  that  date. 
The  sentiment  was  at  least  well  developed  by  the  middle 
of  that  decade.  Flushing  Monthly  Meeting  dealt  in 
1765  with  Samuel  Underbill  for  the  "misconduct  of 
being  concerned  in  importing  negroes."  He  made  the 
following  apology  which  was  accepted  : 

"Whereas  I  have  sometime  past  contrary  to  Friends  Principles 
been  concerned  in  the  importation  of  Negroes  from  Africa, 
which  has  caused  some  uneasiness  in  my  mind,  I  think  I  can 
now  say  I  am  sorry  I  ever  had  any  concern  in  that  Trade,  and 
hope  for  the  future  I  shall  conduct  myself  more  agreeable  to 
Friends  principles  in  any  such  matters ;  I  am  your  friend,  etc. — 
SAML.  UNDERBILL." 

A  similar  apology  came  from  a  Friend  in  New  York 
City  two  years  later,  the  record  of  which  is  as  follows : 

"At  a  Monthly  Meeting  held  at  Flushing  the  yth  of  ye  5th 
mo.  1767.  A  few  lines  was  read  in  this  Meeting  from  Thomas 
Burling,  son  of  James  Burling  deceased,  acknowledging  he  had 
taken  a  Negro  boy  in  the  West  Indies  for  a  bad  debt  and  therein 
did  condemn  the  practice  of  trading  in  negroes  and  was  sorry 
for  the  breach  of  unity  made  thereby  which  this  Meeting 
accepts."  J 

The  country  Friends  were  travelling  rather  faster  than 
the  Friends  who  were  living  in  the  environment  of  the 
city,  and  the  next  step  in  advance  was  taken  by  the 
meetings  in  Dutchess  county.  Friends  were,  by  this 
time,  pretty  generally  agreed  that  it  was  wrong  to  buy  or 
import  slaves,  but  in  1767  Oblong  Monthly  Meeting 
raised  the  question  whether  it  was  "consistent  with  a 
Christian  spirit"  to  hold  a  person  in  slavery  at  all.  This 
question  impressed  the  members  as  being  in  the  life,  and 
it  was  carried  up  to  the  Quarterly  Meeting  for  maturer 
judgment.  It  was  thoroughly,  or,  as  Friends  say, 
"weightily"  considered  at  Purchase  Quarterly  Meeting, 

1  Both  these  incidents   are   taken  from   the    Records   of  Flushing  Monthly 
Meeting. 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  257 

held  in  the  Oblong,  May  2,  1767,  and  this  Minute  was 
adopted  : 

"  In  this  meeting  the  practice  of  trading  in  Negroes,  or  other 
slaves,  and  its  inconsistancy  with  our  religious  principles  was 
revived,  and  the  inconsiderable  difference  between  buying  slaves 
or  keeping  them  in  slavery  we  are  already  possessed  of,  was 
briefly  hinted  at  in  a  short  Query  from  one  of  our  Monthly 
Meetings,  which  is  recommended  to  the  consideration  of 
Quarterly  Meeting,  viz.  If  it  is  not  consistant  with  Christianity  to 
buy  and  sell  our  fellow-men  for  Slaves  during  their  lives,  and  their 
posterity  after  them,  whether  it  is  consistant  with  a  Christian  Spirit 
to  keep  these  in  Slavery  that  we  have  already  in  possession,  by 
purchase,  gift,  or  other  ways" 

This  "  Query "  from  the  Quarterly  Meeting  came  up 
for  consideration  in  the  Yearly  Meeting,  May  3Oth  of  the 
same  year,  and  was  "  left  for  consideration  on  the  minds 
of  Friends  until  next  Yearly  Meeting."  At  the  next 
Yearly  Meeting  (May  28,  1768)  a  committee,  consisting 
of  John  Burling,  Thomas  Seaman,  John  Cock,  Isaac  Doty, 
Matthew  Franklin,  Thomas  Franklin,  Samuel  Bowne,  Jr., 
Thomas  Dobson,  and  Daniel  Bowne,  was  appointed  to 
formulate  an  answer.  These  men  were  not  yet  quite 
ready  for  the  speed  at  which  the  country  Friends  were 
travelling,  and  they  produced  a  conservative,  but  at  the 
same  time  a  very  clear-sighted,  report,  which  was  adopted. 
It  was  as  follows  : 

"We  are  of  the  mind  that  it  is  not  convenient  (considering 
the  circumstances  amongst  us)  to  give  an  answer  to  this  Querie, 
at  least  at  this  time,  as  the  answering  of  it  in  direct  terms 
manifestly  tends  to  cause  divisions,  and  may  introduce  heart 
burnings  and  strife  amongst  us  which  ought  to  be  avoided,  and 
charity  exercised,  and  persuasive  methods  persued,  and  that 
which  makes  for  peace.  We  are,  however,  fully  of  the  mind 
that  Negroes  as  rational  creatures  are  by  Nature  born  free ;  and 
when  the  way  opens  liberty  ought  to  be  extended  to  them ;  and 
they  not  held  in  bondage  for  self  ends.  But  to  turn  them  out 
at  large  indiscriminately  (which  seems  to  be  the  tendency  of  the 
Querie)  will,  we  apprehend,  be  attended  with  great  inconveniency 
as  some  are  too  young  and  some  too  old  to  procure  a  liveli 
hood."  * 

1  Minutes  of  New  York  Yearly  Meeting  for  1768. 


258   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

It  was  the  unvarying  custom  of  Friends  in  the 
colonial  days  not  to  take  any  new  step  which  could  not  be 
taken  in  unity.  That  involved  fairly  slow  progress,  but 
it  also  meant  that  the  corporate  body  was  behind  a 
movement  when  it  was  positively  launched.  In  1771 
the  Yearly  Meeting  decided  that  Friends  who  owned 
slaves  should  not  sell  them  as  property,  except  with  the 
consent  of  their  Monthly  Meetings,  and  a  solid  committee 
was  appointed  to  visit  all  persons  in  the  Society  who  held 
slaves,  to  see  if  the  freedom  of  these  slaves  could  be 
secured.  This  method  of  investigation  was  speedily 
adopted  by  the  subordinate  meetings  as  well,  so  that  by 
1776  all  the  monthly  meetings  in  the  colony  were 
investigating  the  individual  cases  of  slave-holding,  and 
were  labouring  to  eliminate  it  absolutely.  It  was  decided 
further  at  the  Yearly  Meeting  that  year  (1776)  that 
meetings  should  not  receive  services  nor  accept 
financial  contributions  from  any  Friends  holding  slaves, 
and  from  that  time  on  the  Monthly  Meetings  adopted 
the  practice  of  disowning  from  membership  those  belated 
Friends  who  had  not  yet  got  their  consciences  awake  to 
the  evil  of  owning'  persons. 

From  the  outbreak  of  the  Revolution  Friends  began 
to  concentrate  their  efforts  to  secure  better  conditions  for 
those  who  had  been  slaves,  and  to  work  first  for  the 
limitation  and  then  for  the  abolition  of  the  slave  trade  in 
the  country  at  large.  The  part  which  Friends  took  in 
the  great  struggle  for  emancipation  does  not  concern  us 
here,  but  it  is  a  fact  of  historical  importance  that  when  the 
separation  of  the  colonies  from  the  mother  country  was 
finally  accomplished,  Friends  themselves  were  free  and 
clear  of  slave-holding.1 

1  The  Meeting  for  Sufferings  of  New  York  sent  this  following  Petition  to  the 
Governor,  Senate,  and  Assembly  of  the  State  in  1784  : 

' '  The  Petition  of  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings  representing  the  People  called 
Quakers  of  the  same  State  : 

"  Respectfully  sheweth 

' '  That  our  minds  being  impressed  with  an  ardent  concern  for  the  general  good 
of  our  fellow-creatures,  and  that  all  may  enjoy  their  natural  and  unalienable  rights 
without  distinction,  we  believe  it  to  be  our  duty  to  address  you  on  behalf  of  the 
poor  Negroes,  who  have  long  been  a  people  under  great  oppression,  many  of 
them  originally  torn  from  the  land  of  their  nativity  ;  and  brought  into  this  and 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  259 

Here  as  everywhere  else  in  the  American  colonies  the 
Revolutionary  War  brought  Friends  face  to  face  with 
issues  which  profoundly  tested  their  principles  of  peace 
and  which  necessarily  somewhat  sifted  the  Society. 
The  Meeting  for  Sufferings  in  this  Province  was  established 
in  1758  and  this  Meeting  dealt  with  many  difficult 
questions,  rising  out  of  the  war.  The  tendency  of  the 
Society  in  New  York  seems  to  have  been  one  of  sympathy 
with  the  old  order  of  things,  though  every  possible  effort 
was  made  to  keep  the  meetings  from  being  implicated  on 
either  side.  In  1775  the  Committee  of  Safety  for  the 
Colony  of  New  York  requested  a  complete  list  of  male 
Quakers  between  sixteen  and  sixty.  Friends  "  felt 
uneasy  "  to  make  the  list,  and  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings 
refused  the  request.  The  Minute  reads : 

"We  are  of  the  mind  that  we  cannot  comply,  consistent  with 
our  religious  principles.  We  hope  you  will  not  consider  such 
refusal  as  the  effect  of  an  obstinate  disposition,  but  as  it  really 
is  a  truly  conscientious  scruple." 

"In  the  trying  situation  of  outward  affairs,"  when  all 
occupations  were  interrupted,  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings 
recommended  that  a  "stock  for  relief"  be  raised  and  set 
apart  for  helping  Friends  who  were  in  distress  and  straits. 
In  '76  a  requisition  was  made  by  the  military  officers  of 
the  colonial  forces  that  Friends  should  give  a  bond  of 
security  to  endeavour  to  keep  their  cattle  from  falling  into 

other  parts  of  America,  and  sold  into  slavery.  Numbers  of  whom,  with  many  of 
their  offspring,  are  yet  continued  in  a  state  of  bondage.  And  as  there  is  a  Law 
subsisting  which  operates  to  the  discouragement  of  many  of  the  conscientious 
and  well-disposed  inhabitants  of  this  state,  against  liberating  their  slaves,  and  no 
Legislative  provision  yet  made  for  those  who  have  been  set  at  liberty  from 
Religious  motives.  We  therefore  with  submission  intreat  that  ye  may  afford 
them  such  relief  as  you  in  wisdom  may  see  meet,  believing  the  entire  abolition 
of  Slavery  a  matter  worthy  of  the  most  serious  attention  of  the  Legislative  Body. 
And  tho'  we  think  it  needless  to  use  arguments  to  gain  the  assents  of  your  minds 
to  this  great  truth  that  all  mankind  without  distinction  have  equally  a  natural 
right  to  freedom,  yet  we  would  take  the  liberty  in  this  case  to  call  your  attention 
as  fellow  believers  in  Christ,  to  that  excellent  rule  laid  down  by  him,  '  that  what 
soever  ye  would  that  men  should  do  unto  you  do  ye  even  so  unto  them. ' 

"With  due  respect  we  subscribe  ourselves 

"Your  real  friends 

"  Signed  by  order,  and  on  behalf  of  said  Meeting  held  in  New  York  i4th  i2th 
mo.  1784, 

"EDMD.  PRIOR,  clerk." 


260   QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

the  hands  of  the  English  troops.  The  advice  of  the 
Meeting  for  Sufferings  was  "  that  Friends  do  not  comply 
with  this  requisition." 

In  1777  Governor  Tryon  informed  the  Meeting  for 
Sufferings  that  some  Quakers  had  incurred  the  displeasure 
of  the  authorities  by  being  "  too  busy  and  active  in  the 
present  commotions,"  and  to  offset  this  activity  he  proposed 
that  the  Society  of  Friends  should  raise  a  sum  of  money 
to  provide  the  troops  with  stockings  and  other  necessities. 
The  answer  of  the  Meeting  is  calm  and  dignified  but 
very  positive.  It  is  as  follows  : 

"  We  may  inform  the  Governor  that  it  is  with  sorrow  we  may 
acknowledge  the  deviation  that  hath  appeared  in  some  under 
our  name,  notwithstanding  a  care  which  hath  been  extended  in 
our  collective  capacity  to  caution  and  advise  our  Members  in 
these  respects.  But  apprehending  that  the  proposed  contribution 
is  manifestly  contrary  to  our  religious  Testimony  against  war  & 
fightings  which  as  a  Religious  body  we  have  uniformly  maintained 
ever  since  we  were  first  distinguished  as  such.  We  are  therefore 
under  a  necessity  of  declining  a  compliance  therewith,  Very 
sincerely  acknowledging  our  obligation  to  the  Governor  for  his 
friendly  disposition  heretofore  manifested  toward  us  we  can  at 
the  same  time  assure  him  that  our  motives  in  thus  declining  his 
proposal  are  purely  conscientious." 

In  1781  certain  Friends  were  appointed  by  the 
Yearly  Meeting  to  visit  the  meetings  on  Long  Island,  and 
were  "  stopped  by  military  men,"  at  the  order  of  General 
Washington.  A  committee  was  appointed  thereupon  to 
visit  General  Washington  in  person  and  explain  to  him 
the  peaceful  nature  of  the  "  concern,"  but  he  still  refused 
to  let  them  pass.  During  the  hard  closing  months  of 
the  New  York  campaign,  Friends  once  more  issued  a 
document  to  the  membership,  "  affectionately  recom 
mending  the  members  of  the  Society  that  they  be  careful 
to  cherish  in  themselves  and  in  one  another  their  tender 
scruples  against  contributing  to  or  in  any  wise  giving 
countenance  to  the  spirit  of  war,  and  that  they  preserve  a 
conduct  uniformly  consistent  with  our  peaceable  principles 
and  profession." 


CH.  ii  MEETINGS  AND  ACTIVITIES  261 

When  the  war  was  over  and  the  new  order  established, 
Friends  loyally  accepted  it,  but  they  were  themselves 
deeply  affected  by  the  fires  through  which  they  had 
passed.  Those  who  had  believed  that  it  was  right  to 
fight  in  a  great  emergency  had  been  sifted  out  of  the 
Society,  and  those  who  were  left  were  furnace-tested 
peace  men  and  pledged  henceforth  to  maintain  "con 
sistency  to  the  profession."  The  Revolution  was  an 
epoch  period  for  the  Society  not  only  in  issues  of  peace 
and  war,  but  for  the  reformation  of  ideas  in  all  matters  of 
vital  policy.  The  purging  of  slavery  was,  no  doubt,  the 
beginning  of  the  new  moral  awakening  among  Friends. 
The  hard  crisis  and  the  stern  siftings  of  the  Revolution 
further  touched  the  moral  quick,  and  from  this  epoch  the 
leaders  of  the  Society  were  consecrated  with  a  new  zeal  to 
the  business  of  preparing  a  people  of  the  Lord.  The 
Revolution  was  followed  by  a  decided  expansion  of  the 
territory  of  Quakerism  in  the  state  of  New  York,  and  by 
a  revival  of  education  within  the  Society.  During  the 
'eighties  there  arose  a  demand  for  schools  from  every 
section,  and  from  this  time  dates  the  birth  of  the  Quaker 
ideal  for  a  carefully  educated  membership.  All  local 
meetings  were  recommended  "to  use  their  exertions  in 
endeavouring  to  promote  schools  for  the  education  of  the 
rising  generation."  The  definite  plan  for  a  school  in 
New  York  City  was  formulated  in  1781,  and  was  sent  to 
London  in  the  hope  of  securing  from  England  a  Friend 
competent  to  teach  the  proposed  school.  The  plan  is  an 
interesting  revelation  of  educational  conditions  at  that 
time.  It  is  as  follows  : 

"  Our  Yearly  Meeting  for  this  Province  held  at  Westbury  on 
Long  Island  taking  into  consideration  the  expediency  of  our 
Youth  being  properly  instructed  in  the  use  of  learning  under  the 
tuition  of  a  sober  discreet  Friend  recommended  the  same 
through  the  Quarter  to  the  Monthly  Meeting.  And  we  being 
impressed  with  a  like  concern,  well  knowing  the  importance  of  a 
suitable  Education  to  Society  as  well  as  to  individuals,  take  the 
liberty  to  request  the  aid  &  assistance  of  your  Meeting  to  furnish 
us  as  soon  as  may  be  convenient  with  a  young  man,  unmarried, 
a  member  of  our  Society,  of  exemplary  life  and  conversation,  a 


262   QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  n 

very  good  writer,  well  versed  in  Arithmetic,  and  a  competent 
Knowledge  of  English  Grammar.  To  such  a  one  this  Meeting 
will  engage  to  give  annually  the  sum  of  £200  currency  or 
;£i  1 2,  i  os.  od.  sterling,  and  we  will  allow  him  ^£42  sterling  for  his 
passage  to  this  city  where  he  will  reside.  A  school  house  will 
be  found  him  at  our  expense,  but  his  board  and  all  other 
expenses  he  must  meet  himself.  We  apprehend  the  board  may 
at  present  cost  him  about  ^100  currency  or  ^58,  55.  od.  sterling 
not  more.  The  number  of  scholars  probably  about  forty.  We 
would  not  wish  to  debar  him  from  keeping  an  evening  school 
which  if  he  inclines  to,  the  money  from  thence  arising  will  be  a 
perquesite  to  himself.  But  the  money  arising  from  the  scholars 
taught  in  the  day  time  will  go  toward  defraying  the  above 
expenses." l 

Great  things  not  only  for  Friends  but  for  the  education 
of  New  York  City  sprang  from  these  feeble  beginnings, 
for  the  school  thus  organised  became  in  time  the  first 
public  school  in  New  York  City,  and  is  now  the  Friends' 
Seminary  in  that  City.  The  period  just  beyond  the 
Revolution  was  one  of  worldly  prosperity  for  Friends, 
and  they  were  to  the  front  in  commercial  undertakings 
in  the  growing  metropolis,  but  they  did  not  win  their 
success  by  compromise.  At  the  close  of  our  period 
there  were  probably  about  a  thousand  Friends  in  the 
City,2  and  they  were  an  eminently  respectable  group  of 
people,  with  strict  requirements  of  moral  behaviour  and 
with  lofty  ideals  of  spiritual  religion. 

1  From  the  Minutes  of  New  York  Monthly  Meeting  7/11/1781.     In  1787,  the 
teacher  had  every  alternate  seventh  day  off,  but  had  to  furnish  the  ink  and 
firewood  1 

2  There  were  by  actual  count  1826  Friends  in  New  York  City  in  1830. 


BOOK   III 

THE   QUAKERS    IN   THE    SOUTHERN 
COLONIES 


263 


CHAPTER    I 


IN  New  England  the  Quaker  societies  were  formed 
mainly  out  of  persons  who  were  already  profoundly 
religious,  but  dissatisfied  with  the  rigid  theology  which 
prevailed  about  them  ;  and  the  persecution  which  rained 
like  fire  on  the  apostles  and  adherents  of  the  inward  light 
came  from  the  men  who  were  consecrated  to  the  task  of 
building  in  the  New  World  a  Puritan  City  of  God,  with 
the  Bible  for  its  Magna  Charta.  In  New  York  the 
nucleus  of  each  Quaker  group  was,  as  it  had  been  in  New 
England,  a  company  of  persons  already  in  revolt  from 
the  religious  system  about  them,  but  earnestly  seeking 
real  Bread  for  their  souls.  The  persecution,  here,  too, 
fierce  indeed,  but  not  motived  to  the  same  extent  as  in 
Massachusetts  by  the  conviction  that  utter  extirpation  of 
the  heresy  was  the  only  hope  for  the  colony,  came  from 
the  Dutch  magistrates  and  was  administered  in  the 
interests  of  civil  order  rather  than  for  the  protection  of  an 
established  church.  In  the  southern  colonies,  to  a  very 
much  greater  extent  than  in  the  North,  Quakerism, 
especially  in  the  Carolinas,  drew  its  material  from  the 
unchurched  classes  and  gathered  in  persons  of  no  definite 
religious  affiliation.  The  persecution  which  was  meted 
out  in  these  colonies  was,  with  a  few  exceptions  in 
Virginia,  comparatively  mild  and  was  inflicted  in  the 
interests  of  the  established  [English]  Church. 

The  first  attempt  to  propagate  the  Quaker  message  in 
the  southern  colonies,  so  far  as  our  records  and  Journals 

265 


266  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

furnish  information,  was  made  by  Elizabeth  Harris  of 
London,  who  came  out  on  this  hazardous  mission  in  1656, 
about  simultaneously  with  the  arrival  of  Mary  Fisher  and 
Ann  Austin  in  Boston.1  It  has  generally  been  supposed 
that  her  religious  labours  were  in  Virginia,  and  that  the 
first  persons  won  to  Quakerism  in  the  South  were  residents 
of  this  colony,  but  it  seems  practically  certain,  from  the 
evidence  at  hand,  that  Elizabeth  Harris'  "  convincements," 
at  least  those  of  which  we  have  definite  information,  were 
made  in  the  colony  of  Maryland,  though  she  may  have 
performed  some  labour  of  which  we  have  no  accounts  in 
Virginia  as  well. 

Gerard  Roberts,  writing  to  George  Fox  in  July  1657, 
says  : 

"The  Friend  who  went  to  Virginia  [evidently  Elizabeth 
Harris]  is  returned  in  a  pretty  condition.  There  she  was  gladly 
received  by  many  who  met  together,  and  the  Governor  is 
convinced."  2 

The  person  here  called  "the  Governor  who  is  con 
vinced  "  is  perhaps  Robert  Clarkson.  Thomas  Hart  of 
London,  referring  to  Robert  Clarkson  in  a  letter  to 
Thomas  Willan  and  George  Taylor  in  1658,  says,  "I 
suppose  this  man  is  the  governor  of  that  place,"  i.e.  the 
place  visited  by  E.  Harris.8  Now  Robert  Clarkson  was 
beyond  any  question  a  citizen  of  Maryland.  He  was 
never  "  governor  "  of  the  colony,  but  he  was  a  member  of 
the  General  Assembly,  or  House  of  Burgesses,  from  Ann 
Arundel  County,4  and  the  correspondents  have  probably 
used  the  word  "  governor "  in  a  loose  and  untechnical 

1  There  occurs  an  interesting  reference  to  Elizabeth  Harris  in  John  Stubbs' 
letter  to  George  Fox  in  connection  with  the  Battledore  :  ' '  Here  is  [in  London] 
Elizabeth  Harris  who  sometimes  goes  forth  to  steeple-houses  in  sackcloth  and  she 
hath  much  peace  in  this  service  ;  there  was  some  seemed  rather  to  be  against  it, 
which  troubled  her  a  little.  She  spoke  to  me  with  many  tears  about  it  several 
weeks  ago,  and  I  said  I  thought  I  might  write  to  thee  about  it,  and  she  desired  I 
might.  After  she  had  been  at  Cambridge,  it  came  to  her  she  must  go  to 
Manchester  the  sixth  month.  And  so  she  would  be  glad  to  have  a  line  or  two 
from  thee  about  it  before  she  go,  as  soon  as  can  be,  the  time  draws  near  of  her 
passing." — Crosfield  MSS.  (1660)  Devonshire  House. 

8  Swarthmore  Collection,  iii.  127. 

8  Swarthmore  Collection,  iv.  197. 

4  Archives  of  Maryland,  i.  382. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    267 

sense.  They  have  also  been  vague  and  hazy  in  their 
colonial  geography,  and  have  probably  used  the  word 
"  Virginia  "  for  this  general  section  of  the  great,  more  or 
less  unknown,  New  World. 

The  most  concrete  information  which  we  possess 
about  the  success  of  Elizabeth  Harris'  labours  and  the 
locality  reached  by  her  is  a  Letter  written  by  this  "con 
vinced  governor,"  Robert  Clarkson.  His  letter  is  written 
from  Severn  under  date  of  January  14,  1658  [Old  Style, 
Eleventh  Mo.  1657],  and  reads  as  follows: 

"  Elizabeth  Harris,  Dear  Heart,  I  salute  thee  in  the  tender 
love  of  the  Father,  which  moved  thee  toward  us  and  I  do  own 
thee  to  have  been  a  minister  by  the  will  of  God  to  bear  the 
outward  testimony  to  the  inward  word  of  truth  in  me  and  others. 
Of  which  word  of  life  God  hath  made  my  wife  a  partaker  with 
me  and  hath  established  our  hearts  in  His  fear,  and  likewise  Ann 
Dorsey  in  a  more  large  measure ;  her  husband  I  hope  abides 
faithful;  likewise  John  Baldwin  and  Henry  Caplin;  Charles 
Balye  abides  convinced  and  several  in  those  parts  where  he 
dwells.1  Elizabeth  Beasley  abides  as  she  was  when  thou  was 
here  [apparently  "  convinced  "].  Thomas  Cole  and  William  Cole 
have  both  made  open  confession  of  the  truth ;  likewise  Henry 
Woolchurch,  and  many  others  suffer  with  us  the  reproachful 
name  [of  Quaker].  William  Fuller  abides  convinced.  I  know 
not  but  William  Durand  doth  the  like.2  Nicholas  Wayte  abides 
convinced.  Glory  be  to  God  who  is  the  living  fountain  and 
fills  all  that  abide  in  Him. 

"  The  two  messengers  thou  spoke  of  in  thy  letters  have  not 
yet  come  to  this  place ;  we  heard  of  two  come  to  Virginia  in 
the  fore  part  of  the  winter,3  but  we  heard  that  they  were  soon 
put  in  prison,  and  not  suffered  to  pass.  We  heard  further  that 
they  desired  liberty  to  pass  to  this  place,  but  it  was  denied  them, 
whereupon  one  of  them  answered,  that  though  they  might  not 
be  suffered,  yet  he  must  come  another  time.  We  have  heard 
that  they  are  to  be  kept  in  prison  till  the  ship  that  brought  them 
be  ready  to  depart  the  country  again,  and  then  to  be  sent  out  of 

1  The  Charles  Bayly  mentioned  here  helped  John  Perrot  in  1661  to  secure 
release  from  his  confinement  in  Rome  and  became  one  of  his  extreme  followers  in 
the  schism  which  is  discussed  farther  on  in  this  chapter. 

2  William  Durand  was  one  of  Cromwell's  Commissioners  for  the  government 
of  Maryland  and  was  Secretary  of  the  Commission.     He  may  possibly  have  been 
the  person  referred  to  as  "  governor." 

8  Probably  Thomas  Thurston  and  Josiah  Coale. 


268   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

the  country.  We  have  disposed  of  the  most  part  of  the  books 
which  were  sent,  so  that  all  parts  where  there  are  Friends  are 
furnished  and  every  one  that  desires  it  may  have  benefit  of  them  ; 
at  Herring  Creek,  Rhoad  River,  South  River,  all  about  Severn, 
the  Brand  Neck,  and  thereabouts  the  Seven  Mountains  and 
Kent.  .  .  .  With  my  dear  love  I  salute  thy  husband  and  the  rest 
of  Friends ;  and  rest  with  thee  in  the  Eternal  Word  which  abideth 
forever.  Farewell,  ROBERT  CLARKSON."  * 

It  is  evident  that  the  writer  of  this  letter  was  not  in 
Virginia.  He  has  heard  of  the  arrival  of  two  Friends  in 
Virginia,  but  he  says,  "  they  have  not  come  to  this  place," 
and  he  adds  that  "  they  desired  liberty  from  their  prison 
in  Virginia  to  pass  to  this  place."  Robert  Clarkson  was, 
as  has  been  shown  above,  an  inhabitant  of  the  colony  of 
Maryland.  In  1662  he  was  arrested  and  brought  before 
the  court  of  Ann  Arundel  County  for  having  violated  the 
military  act  of  that  colony  and  was  fined  five  hundred 
pounds  of  cask-tobacco.2  He  had  thus  at  that  date 
plainly  become  a  Quaker.  William  Durand  was  also  a 
citizen  of  Maryland.  Thomas  and  William  Cole  and 
Henry  Woolchurch,  mentioned  in  the  above  letter,  were 
also  Maryland  Friends.  Severn  is  a  well-known  Maryland 
region,  and  all  the  places  named  where  the  books  were 
distributed  are  familiar  localities  not  far  remote  from  the 
present  city  of  Annapolis.  Therefore,  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  Bowden  and  Janney3  and  most  other  writers  on 
Quaker  history  have  located  Elizabeth  Harris'  "  convince- 
ments"  in  Virginia,  between  the  Rappahannock  and 
York  Rivers,  I  am  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  we  are 
here  dealing  with  the  origin  of  Quakerism  in  the  colony 
of  Maryland.4 

Sometime  in  1657,  Josiah  Coale,  of  Bristol,  and  Thomas 
Thurston,a  Quaker  preacher,  from  Gloucestershire, England, 
already  known  to  us  for  their  labours  in  the  Northern 
Colonies,  landed  in  Virginia,  having  come,  as  one  of  them 

1  The  original,  which  I  have  somewhat  shortened,  is  in  Swarthmore  Collection 
iii.  7. 

a  Besse,  ii.  381. 

8  Janney's  History  of  the  Friends,  (1860)  i.  431. 

4  For  a  similar  view  see  M'lllwaine's  The  Struggle  of  Protestant  Dissenters  for 
Religious  Toleration  in  Virginia  (Johns  Hopkins  Studies,  vol.  xii.),  p.  20. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS   IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    269 

writes,  because  they  "  were  made  sensible  of  the  groaning 
of  the  oppressed  seed  in  that  place."  l  So  far  as  we  know 
they  were  the  first  to  plant  the  Quaker  "  seed "  in  this 
great  southern  colony.  They  seem  to  have  spent  six 
months  or  more  in  Virginia — some  of  this  period  perhaps 
being  wasted  in  prison  2 — and  they  were  evidently  very 
successful  in  reaching  the  people,  since  there  are  many 
evidences  from  this  time  forward  of  the  widespread 
prevalence  of  Quakers  in  several  parts  of  the  colony. 

We  have  seen  already  that  the  incipient  movement  was 
somewhat  interrupted  by  the  arrest  and  imprisonment  of 
the  visitors.  We  must  now  examine  briefly  the  methods 
which  were  contrived  in  Virginia  for  suppressing  the  tide 
of  new  religious  thought  which  was  sweeping — as  it  proved, 
irresistibly — into  this  Episcopalian  colony.  As  little  as 
in  Massachusetts  had  there  formed  in  the  minds  of  the 
Virginia  colonists  any  adequate  idea  that  religious  tolera 
tion  was  a  virtue.  The  early  laws  of  Virginia  insist  with 
much  iteration  on  uniformity.  The  earliest  danger  to 
uniformity  in  the  colony  came  from  the  immigration  of 
adventurous  Roman  Catholics,  and  the  first  anti-tolera 
tion  laws  were  therefore  framed  against  these.  In  1642  it 
was  decreed  that  "  no  popish  recusants  shall  at  any  time 
hereafter  exercise  the  place  or  places  of  secret  counsellors, 
register  or  comiss  :  surveyors,  sheriffs,  or  any  other  publique 
place,  but  be  utterly  disabled" 3  The  Act  further  provides 
that  any  one  holding  office  and  refusing  to  take  "  the  oath 
of  allegiance  and  supremacy  "  shall  be  dismissed  from  said 
office,  and  fined  1000  pounds  of  tobacco.  The  following 
year  it  was  enacted  that  "  all  ministers  whatsoever  which 
shall  reside  in  the  collony  are  to  be  conformable  to  the 
orders  and  constitutions  of  the  Church  of  England,  and 
not  otherwise  to  be  permitted  to  teach  or  preach  publickly 
or  privately.  And  the  Governor  and  Counsil  do  take  care 
that  all  nonconformists,  upon  notice  of  them,  shall  be 
compelled  to  depart  the  collony  with  all  convenience."  4 

1  Letter  of  Josiah  Coale  to  Margaret  Fell. — Bowden,  i.  342. 

3  We  learn  this  fact  from  Robert  Clarkson's  letter. 

1  Hening's  Statutes  at  Large  of  Virginia,  i.  268-269. 

4  Hening,  i.  277. 


270  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  u, 

When  the  Quakers  first  disturbed  the  religious 
uniformity  of  the  colony  these  laws — grown  innocuous 
with  time — were  revived  and  set  into  operation  to  meet 
the  novel  situation,  but  they  were  soon  found  to  be 
inadequate  for  the  trouble  in  hand,  and  the  lawmakers 
grappled  anew  with  the  emergency.1  In  the  spring  of 
1660  a  definite  Act  was  passed  against  Quakers  as  such, 
and  the  wording  of  the  Act  implies  that  the  objection  to 
Quakers  was  not  primarily  based  on  doctrine,  but  on  the 
supposition  that  they  were  a  menace  to  the  stability  of 
social  life  and  civil  government.  The  Act  is  entitled  "  An 
Act  for  Suppressing  Quakers,"  and  reads  : 

"Whereas  there  is  an  unreasonable  and  turbulent  sort  of  people, 
commonly  called  Quakers,  who,  contrary  to  the  law,  do  dayly 
gather  together  unto  them  unlawfull  Assemblies  and  congregations 
of  people  teaching  and  publishing  lies,  miracles,  false  visions, 
prophecies,  and  doctrines,  which  have  influence  upon  the  com 
munities  of  men,  both  ecclesiastical  and  civill,  endeavoring  and 
attempting  thereby  to  destroy  religion,  lawes,  communities,  and 
all  bonds  of  civil  socitie,  leaving  it  arbitrarie  to  every  vaine  and 
vitious  person  whether  men  shall  be  safe,  laws  established, 
offenders  punished,  and  Governors  rule,  hereby  disturbing  the 
publique  peace  and  just  interest :  to  prevent  and  restraine  which 
mischiefe:  it  is  enacted  that  no  master  or  commander  of  any 
shippe  or  other  vessel  do  bring  into  this  collonie  any  person  or 
persons  called  Quakers,  under  penalty  of  ;£ioo  to  be  levied 
upon  him  and  his  estate,  etc.  That  all  Quakers  as  have  beene 
questioned  or  shall  hereafter  arrive  shall  be  apprehended  where 
soever  they  shall  be  found,  and  they  be  imprisoned  without 
baile  or  mainprize  till  they  do  adjure  this  country  or  put  in 
security  with  all  speed  to  depart  the  collonie  and  not  to  return 
again.  And  if  any  should  dare  to  presume  to  returne  hither 
after  such  departure  to  be  proceeded  against  as  contemner  of 
the  lawes  and  magistracy  and  punished  accordingly,  and  caused 
again  to  depart  the  country.  And  if  they  should  the  third  time 
be  so  audacious  and  impudent  as  to  returne  hither  to  be 
proceeded  against  as  ffelons.  That  noe  person  shall  entertain 
any  of  the  Quakers,  .  .  .  nor  permit  in  or  near  his  house  any 
Assemblies  of  Quakers  in  the  like  penalty  of  ;£ioo. 

1  It  should,  however,  be  stated  that  this  earliest  attempt  to  frustrate  the  work 
of  Quaker  missionaries  was  in  the  Commonwealth  period,  when  the  Puritan 
influence  was  strongest. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    271 

"  And  that  no  person  do  presume  on  their  peril  to  dispose  or 
publish  their  books,  pamphlets,  or  libells,  bearing  the  title  of 
their  tenets  and  opinions." l 

In  1662,  under  an  Act  to  prevent  the  profaning  of 
Sunday,  new  measures  were  levelled  against  them.  The 
Act  provides  that : 

"  Quakers  who,  out  of  nonconformity  to  the  Church,  totally 
absent  themselves,  are  liable  to  a  fine  of  £20  for  every  month's 
absence  from  Church.  And  all  Quakers,  for  assembling  in 
unlawful  assemblies  and  conventicles,  shall  be  fined  and  pay, 
each  of  them,  there  taken,  200  pounds  of  tobacco  for  each  time." 2 

In  the  same  year  it  was  decreed  that  as  there  are  in 
the  colony  "  many  persons  who,  out  of  aversenesse  to  the 
orthodox  established  religion,  or  out  of  new  fangled 
conceits  of  their  owne  heretical  inventions,  refuse  to  have 
their  children  baptized,"  they  shall  be  fined  2000  pounds 
of  tobacco  for  every  refusal — half  to  go  to  the  informer.8 

These  laws,  however,  though  they  were  vigorously 
applied,  proved  utterly  ineffectual.  Quaker  ministers 
continued  to  come  as  though  they  were  wanted,  and  the 
people  were  "  convinced "  as  though  it  were  the  popular 
course.  The  fact  of  the  increase  of  Quakerism  is  proved 
not  from  partisan  Journals,  but  from  Colonial  Records. 
In  March  1662  it  is  declared  that  "  persons  called  Quakers 
do  assemble  themselves  in  greate  numbers  in  several  parts 
of  this  colony,"  and  they  are  charged  with  "  maintayning 
a  secret  and  strict  correspondency  among  themselves," 
and  of  holding  "  dangerous  opinions  and  tenets."  It  is 
thereupon  enacted,  evidently  in  imitation  of  the  English 
Conventicle  Act,  that  for  separating  from  the  Established 
worship,  and  for  assembling  to  the  number  of  five  or  more 
in  religious  worship  not  authorised  by  the  laws  of  Virginia, 
a  fine  of  200  pounds  of  tobacco  shall  be  imposed  on  each 
person,  with  banishment  from  the  colony  for  the  third 
offence.  A  fine  of  5000  pounds  of  tobacco  was  imposed 

1  Hening,  i.  532-533.  2  Hening,  ii.  48. 

8  Hening,  ii.  165.  This  statute  implies  that  there  were  Anabaptists  in  the 
colony  as  well  as  Quakers,  for  the  latter  not  only  objected  to  the  baptism  of  infants, 
but  of  adults  as  well. 


272   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

"  for  entertaining  Quakers  to  teach  or  preach  in  their 
houses."  All  fines  were  to  be  remitted  if  the  Quaker 
would  give  security  that  he  would  "  forbeare  to  meete " 
in  such  assemblies  in  the  future.1 

The  most  objectionable  feature  of  this  anti-Quaker 
legislation  was  the  provision  that  a  proportion  of  the  fine 
— in  some  cases  a  half  of  it — should  go  to  the  informer, 
and  this  mean  incentive  was  offered  to  induce  neighbours 
to  spy  on  each  other,  and  to  report  violations  of  uniformity. 
The  colonial  records  show  that  there  was  considerable 
suffering  under  these  laws,  and  Besse  has  preserved  the 
story  of  one  case  of  brutal  persecution,  namely,  the 
imprisonment  at  Jamestown  of  George  Wilson  of  England, 
and  his  companion,  William  Cole  of  Maryland.  They 
were  thrown  into  an  intolerable  dungeon — "a  nasty, 
stinking  prison  "  where  Wilson  "  laid  down  his  life  " — and 
the  story  of  the  sufferings  in  this  prison  is  so  dreadful  that 
it  is  hardly  printable  in  detail,  but  the  spirit  of  love  and 
forgiveness  and  the  triumphant  note  which  breathe 
through  their  communications  are  most  impressive.  "  For 
all  their  cruelty,"  writes  Wilson,  "  I  can  truly  say, '  Father, 
forgive  them,  they  know  not  what  they  do,'"2  and  the 
biographer  of  William  Cole  says :  "  Through  his  ministry 
many  were  established  in  the  truth,  and  though  he  was 
much  decayed  in  his  body  by  his  cruel  imprisonment,  and 
never  recovered  from  it,  he  felt  the  living  presence  of  the 
Lord  with  him." 8 

This  persecution  was  imposed  and  these  anti-Quaker 
laws  passed  in  spite  of  royal  instructions  in  favour  of 
religious  liberty.  Charles  II.  wrote  to  Governor  Berkeley 
in  1662  : 

"  Because  wee  are  willing  to  give  all  possible  encouragement 
to  persons  of  different  persuasion  in  matters  of  Religion  to 
transport  themselves  thither  with  their  stocks;  you  are  not  to 
suffer  any  man  to  be  molested  or  disquieted  in  the  exercise  of  his 
Religion^  so  he  be  content  with  a  quiet  and  peaceable  enjoying 
it,  not  giving  therein  offense  or  scandall  to  the  Government"  4 

1  Hening,  ii.  181-183.  2  Besse,  ii.  381  ;  Bishop,  p.  351. 

8  Piety  Promoted,  \.  80-8 1.  *  Neill's  Virginia.  Carolorum,  p.  392. 


CH.I   QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    273 

"But  notwithstanding  enactments  against  the  Quakers," 
writes  Neill,  "  their  travelling  preachers  persisted  in  going  to  out 
of  the  way  places,  without  money  and  asking  for  none,  yet 
preaching  a  gospel  of  peace  and  good  will,  as  far  as  they  under 
stood  the  teaching  of  Christ.  Their  cheerful  endurance  of 
hardship,  with  their  plain  teaching,  attracted  the  attention  and 
aroused  the  consciences  of  rude  frontiersmen,  who,  hitherto,  had 
no  one  to  care  for  their  souls,  and  Quaker  meetings  multiplied." l 

The  first  Quaker  missionaries  in  Virginia  were,  as  we 
have  seen,  Josiah  Coale  and  Thomas  Thurston.  They 
travelled  northward,  labouring  as  they  went,  especially  in 
Maryland,  and  so  on,  by  an  almost  unimaginable  wilder 
ness  journey,  to  New  England,  where  they  took  their 
share  of  the  vials  of  the  Puritan  medicine  for  Quakers. 
Thurston,  however,  was  soon  back  in  Virginia,  where  he 
had  another  period  of  imprisonment.  On  his  release  he 
appears  to  have  carried  many  colonists  into  the  Quaker 
movement,  for  Josiah  Coale,  writing  from  New  England 
to  Margaret  Fell,  tells  her  that  Thomas  Thurston  is  in 
Virginia,  and  says  :  "  The  living  power  of  the  Lord  goes 
along  with  him,  and  there  is  like  to  be  a  great  gathering."2 

Three  of  the  Woodhouse  voyagers,  William  Robinson, 
Christopher  Holder,  and  Robert  Hodgson,  did  missionary 
work  in  Virginia  in  1658 — probably  Humphrey  Norton 
was  there  in  1659 — and  as  happened  wherever  these 
enthusiastic  souls  went,  there  were  marked  results  of  their 
preaching  and  personal  labour.  William  Robinson  says 
in  an  extant  Letter  :  "  There  are  many  people  convinced, 
and  some  in  several  parts  are  brought  into  the  sense  and 
feeling  of  truth." 8  Josiah  Coale  was  back  in  the  colony 
in  1660,  and  wrote  of  his  visit  to  George  Fox  in  these 
encouraging  words :  "  I  left  Friends  in  Virginia  generally 
very  well  and  fresh  in  the  truth.  I  believe  I  shall  be  in 
Virginia  again."4 

George  Rofe,  an  English  Quaker  who  had  a  long  list 
of  imprisonments  behind  him,  contributed  in  1661  to  the 

1  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  296. 

z  Letter  in  Bowden,  i.  343. 

8  Letter  of  William  Robinson,  1659,  quoted  by  Bowden,  i.  346 

4  Coale's  Letter  in  A.R.B.  Collection,  No.  44. 


274  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

spread  of  Quakerism  in  Virginia.     Our  only  account  of 
his  visit  is  in  a  letter  of  his  to  Stephen  Crisp  : 

"  God  hath  prospered  my  soul  according  to  my  desire  and 
hath  blessed  His  work  in  my  hands;  and  hath  made  me  an 
instrument  of  good  to  many  through  these  countries.  .  .  .  The 
truth  prevaileth  through  the  most  of  all  these  parts  [Barbadoes], 
and  many  settled  meetings  there  are  in  Maryland  and  Virginia 
and  New  England  .  .  .  through  all  which  places  I  have  travelled 
in  the  power  of  the  Spirit  and  in  the  great  dominion  of  the 
truth,  having  a  great  and  weighty  service  for  the  Lord." 1 

There  was  a  large  convincement  to  Quakerism  in 
Lower  Norfolk  County,  and  the  County  records  show  that 
the  Friends  of  this  region  had  much  to  suffer.  Under 
date  of  June  27,  1663,  Governor  Berkeley  appointed  a 
commission  to  see  that  "  the  abominate  seede  of  ye 
Quakers  spread  not,"  and  he  urges  the  gentlemen  named 
on  the  commission  to  have  "  an  exact  care  of  this  pestilent 
sect  of  ye  Quakers." z 

But  already  before  this  urging  came  from  the  Governor 
the  desire  for  a  share  of  the  fines  was  pushing  the  sheriffs 
to  activity.  There  are  many  entries  like  the  following : 

"June  10,  1 66 1.  Whereas  Mr.  John  Hill,  high-sheriff,  hath 
given  information  and  presented  Benjamin  Forby  for  admitting 
and  suffering  Quakers  at  his  house  being  contrary  to  ye  lawes  of 
this  country,  ye  said  Forby  is  taken  into  custody  to  be  tried  for 
breaking  the  lawes  against  such  people."  8 

"December  20,  1662.  The  High  Shreive  of  the  County  did 
take  divers  persons  who  were  at  an  unlawful  meetinge  with  those 
commonly  called  Quakers — They  were  fined  200  pounds  of 
tobacco  each  person,  of  whom  there  were  twenty."  4 

"May  3,  1663.  Twelve  persons  were  arrested  at  the  house 
of  Richard  Russell,  and  Russell  was  fined  ;£ioo  for  entertaining 
and  permitting  the  meeting,  half  of  which  went  to  the  informer, 
William  Hill,  'High  Shreive.'  The  i2th  of  November,  twenty- 
two  '  persons  called  Quakers '  were  arrested  at  Richard  Russell's 
house  where  John  Porter,  junior,  was  '  speaking.'  The  preachers 

1  Crisp  Collection  of  MSS.  No.  102.  There  were  many  other  labourers  in 
this  field  of  whose  work  we  possess  few  or  no  details.  Mention  should  be  made 
of  Elizabeth  Hooton,  Joan  Brocksoppe,  Joseph  Nicholson,  John  Liddal,  and 
Jane  Millard. 

*  Lower  Norfolk  County  Antiquary,  iii.  78. 

*  Ibid.  iii.  105.  4  Ibid.  iii.  p.  141. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    275 

were    fined  500  pounds  of  tobacco,   the    'entertainer'  of  the 
meeting  5000  pounds,  and  each  attender  200  pounds." l 

"November  20,  1663.  Nine  'people  commonly  called 
Quakers  were  seized  for  holding  an  unlawful  assembly  aboard  ye 
Shipp  Blissinge,  riding  at  anchor  in  the  southern  branch  of  the 
Elizabeth  River.'  John  Porter,  junior,  was  speaking.  They 
were  all  fined  200  pounds  of  tobacco."2 

Some  of  the  prominent  Friends  of  this  Elizabeth  River 
region  had  been  the  actors  in  a  strange  lawsuit  a  few 
years  before  they  became  Friends.  In  1659  Ann  Godby 
— a  person  often  arrested  in  the  'sixties  as  a  Quaker — was 
charged  with  "  casting  slander  and  scandall  on  the  good 
name  and  creditt  of  Nicholas  Robinson's  wife,  terming  her 
a  witch."  Ann  was  proved  guilty  of  the  charge,  and  her 
husband  was  fined  300  pounds  of  tobacco  for  the  freedom 
of  his  wife's  tongue.  John  Porter,  junior,  was  one  of  the 
Justices  in  the  suit.  Three  years  later  Ann  Godby  was  a 
staunch  Quaker,  and  John  Porter,  junior,  was  the  foremost 
Quaker  "  minister "  in  the  county.  Whether  Nicholas 
Robinson's  wife  came  into  the  new  Society  or  not  I 
cannot  prove,  though  I  find  that  many  Robinson  women 
did.8 

It  seems  impossible,  in  this  world  of  conflicting  views, 
to  have  any  movement  for  the  illumination  and  spiritual 
enlargement  of  men  which  is  not  more  or  less  blocked  and 
hampered  by  the  blunders,  the  littleness,  and  the  selfish 
ness  of  persons  who  are  one-sided,  and  who  push  some  one 
aspect  of  the  "  truth  "  out  of  balance  until  it  turns  out  to 
be  misleading  "  error."  Every  apostolic  undertaking  is 
more  or  less  marred  by  some  misguided  Hymenaeus  or 
Philetus  "  whose  word  eats  like  a  gangrene."  *  John 
Perrot,  originally  "  a  man  of  great  natural  parts,"  and  who 
was  inspired  in  1660  with  the  conviction  that  he  was 
divinely  sent  to  Rome  for  the  conversion  of  the  Pope, 
became  the  instrument  of  confusion  and  schism  in  Virginia, 
and  nearly  wrecked  the  work  so  well  begun  in  the  colony. 
There  was  evidently  a  strain  of  insanity  in  him,  but  even 

1  Lower  Norfolk  County  Antiquary,  iii.  pp.  79-110.  2  Ibid.  iii.  p.  109, 

8  Ibid.  iii.  p.  36.  «  a  Tim.  ii.  17. 


276   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

his  very  unusual  psychic  traits  only  made  him  more 
captivating  and  influential  with  the  simple-minded  people 
who  were  impressed  that  he  exhibited  "greater  spirituality" 
than  did  the  other  exponents  of  Quakerism.  He  pushed 
the  testimony  against  form  and  ceremony  to  the  absurd 
extreme  of  "  nihilism  " — there  were  to  be  no  forms,  not 
even  the  "  form "  of  holding  meetings  for  worship ! 
Details  of  his  visit  in  Virginia  are  lacking,  but  the  corre 
spondence  and  Journals  of  travelling  Friends  bear  witness 
to  what  they  call  "  the  leaven  of  his  unclean  spirit."  "  He 
has  done  much  hurt,"  write  in  1663  Mary  Tomkins  and 
Alice  Ambrose,  two  persecution-tried  missionaries,  who 
visited  Virginia  in  1662,  "and  he  has  made  our  travels 
hard  and  our  labours  [in  Virginia]  sore.  What  we  have 
borne  and  suffered  concerning  him  has  been  more  and 
harder  than  all  we  have  received  from  our  enemies." * 

It  has  been  shown  that  the  first  "  convincement "  to 
Quakerism  in  the  South  was  in  Maryland  under  the 
ministry  of  Elizabeth  Harris,  who  gathered  a  large  group 
of  Friends  about  Severn  and  Kent.  This  beginning  was 
soon  followed  up  by  the  work  of  Josiah  Coale  and 
Thomas  Thurston,  who  visited  many  sections  of  this 
colony  on  their  travels  to  New  England  in  1658.  They 
appear  to  have  found  considerable  response  to  their 
message,  and  there  were  many  colonists  who  were  ready 
to  hazard  everything  for  what  powerfully  appealed  to 
them  as  the  truth.2 

The  Records  of  the  Governor  and  Council  of  Mary 
land  furnish  our  main  clues  to  the  success  of  their  under 
taking,  and  to  the  suffering  which  it  involved.3  The 

1  Letter  of  Mary  Tomkins  and  Alice  Ambrose  to  George  Fox  (Swarthmore 
Collection,  iv.   239)     What  they  actually  received  from  their   "enemies" — the 
authorities  of  Virginia — was  the  infliction  of  thirty-two  lashes  apiece  from  a  nine- 
corded  whip,  they  being  pilloried  "  in  an  uncivil  manner,"  with  seizure  of  all 
their  goods  and  expulsion  from  the  colony.  — New  England  Judged,  p.  439. 

2  They  were  entertained  in  Maryland  by  Richard  Preston  and  William  Berry, 
both  of  whom  were  prominent  men  in  the  colony.     Berry's  home  was  at  Chop- 
tank,  and  he  became  a  leading  man  and  a  preacher  among  the  Friends. 

8  The  Provincial  Assembly  of  Maryland  had  adopted  an  Ordinance  of 
Toleration  in  1649.  It  was,  however,  not  effective  in  practice.  This  change  of 
attitude  in  the  matter  of  toleration  was  largely  due  to  the  influence  of  the  new 
Governor  of  the  colony,  Governor  Fendall. 


CH.I   QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    277 

first  entry  about  Quakers  in  the  Colonial  Records  of 
Maryland  is  under  date  of  July  8,  1658.  It  is  in  a 
minute  of  the  proceedings  of  the  Council,  or  Upper 
House,  held  at  Patuxent,  and  it  reports  the  "  alarm " 
felt  by  "  the  increase  of  the  Quakers." 1 

Under  the  same  date  (July  8,  1658)  appears  this 
entry :  "  Upon  information  that  Thomas  Thurston  and 
Josiah  Coale  had  refused  to  subscribe  the  engagement  by 
the  Articles  of  24th  March  [involving  an  oath]  a  warrant 
was  issued  to  the  Sheriffs  to  bring  them  to  Court." 2 

July  1 6,  1658:  "Upon  information  that  Thomas 
Thurston  was  in  prison  and  Josiah  Coale  was  at  Anne 
Arundel  seducing  the  people  and  dissuading  the  people 
from  taking  the  engagement  [on  account  of  the  oath] 
ordered  the  Sheriff  of  Anne  Arundel  to  take  the  body 
of  Josiah  Coale  and  Thomas  Thurston."  The  warrant 
states  that  "  all  who  are  of  their  Church  or  Judgment  do 
refuse  to  subscribe  the  engagement."  8 

July  22,  1658:  It  is  recorded  that  William  Burges 
and  Thomas  Meares  refused  to  take  the  oath  as  com 
missioners  and  justices  of  the  peace,  "  pretending  that  it 
was  in  no  case  lawful  to  swear."4  As  they  had  both 
formerly  taken  the  oath  without  any  compunctions,  it 
is  evident  that  they  had  come  under  Quaker  influence. 
When  the  case  of  these  justices  came  up  for  action, 
Michael  Brookes  of  Calvert  County  joined  them  in  the 
refusal  to  swear,  and  the  three  were  fined.5  Thomas 
Meares  appears  later  in  the  colonial  records  as  a  full- 
fledged  Quaker.6 

July  23,  1658:  The  Council  took  into  consideration 
"  the  insolent  behaviour  of  some  people  called  Quakers," 
who  "  stood  covered  "  in  presence  of  the  Court,  "  refused 
to  subscribe  the  engagement,"  and  exhibited  principles 
which  "  tended  to  the  destruction  of  the  government." 
They  were  given  their  choice  of  subscribing  the  engage 
ment  by  the  2oth  of  August,  or  to  "  depart  the  Province 
on  paine  due  to  rebels  and  traitors."  7 

1  Archives  of  Maryland,  iii.  347.  a  Ibid.  iii.  347.  '  Ibid.  iii.  348. 

4  Ibid.  iii.  351.          6  Ibid.  iii.  358.         *  Ibid.  iii.  394.  7  Ibid.  iii.  352. 


278   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

On  his  return  from  New  England,  Thomas  Thurston 
engaged  again  in  religious  work  in  Maryland,  and  again 
came  into  collision  with  the  authorities.  Under  date  of 
July  23,  1659,  this  record  appears  : 

"It  is  well  known  in  this  province  that  there  have  bin 
several  vagabonds  and  persons  known  by  the  name  of  Quakers 
that  have  presumed  to  come  into  this  province,  as  well  dissuad 
ing  the  people  from  complying  with  the  military  discipline  in 
this  time  of  danger  [there  was  at  the  time  an  armed  contest 
between  the  '  Baltimore  faction '  and  the  '  Clayborne  faction '], 
as  also  from  giving  testimony  [under  oath]  or  being  [sworn] 
Jurors  or  bearing  any  office  in  the  province." 

Such  persons  are  ordered  whipped  from  constable  to 
constable  until  they  reach  the  bounds  of  the  province.1 
Eleven  days  later  (August  3,  1659),  Thurston  was  "for 
ever  banished  this  province,"  on  pain  of  being  whipped 
thirty-eight  lashes,  and  then  sent  out  of  the  province.  It 
was  decreed  the  same  date  that  "  any  person  presuming 
to  receive,  harbour,  or  conceal  the  said  Thomas  Thurston  " 
should  be  fined  500  pounds  of  tobacco.2 

Besse  furnishes  a  long  list  of  persons — presumably 
persons  "  convinced  "  of  Quaker  principles — who  suffered 
under  the  Maryland  government  in  1658  for  refusing  to 
fight,  or  to  take  an  oath,  or  for  entertaining  Quakers. 
This  list  contains  thirty  names,  which  probably  indicates 
the  number  of  adult  males  who  had  become  Friends  in 
the  colony  in  i658.3  The  fine  for  entertaining  a  Quaker 
missionary  was  £3,  153. 

This  colony  was  also  visited,  as  Virginia  was,  by 
William  Robinson,  Christopher  Holder,  and  Robert 
Hodgson  in  1659,  and  as  happened  everywhere  "a  large 
convincement "  resulted  from  their  labours.  Josiah  Coale 
came  through  Maryland  a  second  time,  for  a  visit  of  ten 
weeks,  in  1660,  and,  under  the  influence  of  the  Restora 
tion  in  England,  he  found  "the  spirit  of  persecution 
chained  down  for  a  season."  He  reports  "precious 
meetings "  and  "  the  Lord's  precious  presence  and  love 

1  Archives  of  Maryland,  iii.  362.  2  Ibid.  iii.  364. 

8  Besse,  ii.  378-380. 


CH.  i   QUAKERS   IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    279 

amongst  us  in  our  assemblies." l  The  "  chaining "  of 
the  spirit  of  persecution  did  not  last  long,  for  Coale 
was  apprehended  and  banished  soon  after  this  letter  was 
written,  and  prosecutions  for  refusal  to  swear  and  fight 
are  frequent.2  An  important  letter  from  Coale,  written 
from  Virginia,  Feb.  3,  1661,  says:  "As  concerning 
Friends  in  the  Province  of  Maryland,  I  left  them  generally 
very  well  and  fresh  in  the  truth,  though  I  found  them  not 
so  ;  for  through  judging  one  another  and  clashing  amongst 
themselves  they  were  even  become  as  dry  branches  and 
there  was  little  savour  of  life  amongst  them." 8 

George  Rofe  soon  followed  on  after  Josiah  Coale, 
and  he  reports,  under  date  of  1661,  finding  "many 
settled  meetings  in  Maryland,"  and  he  says  that  he 
"travelled  in  the  power  of  the  Spirit  and  in  great 
dominion  of  the  truth,  having  a  great  and  weighty  service 
for  the  Lord." 4  We  have  too  few  data  to  enable  us  to 
present  in  any  impressive  way  the  actual  internal  life  of 
the  new  society  at  this  early  stage  of  its  career,  but  it 
is  evident  that  Friends  in  this  region  at  this  period  were 
in  constant  jeopardy  in  body  and  goods,5  though  there 
is  abundant  evidence  that  they  were  valiant  in  spirit, 
and  ready  to  suffer  to  any  limit  for  their  loyalty  to  their 
light  It  should,  however,  be  noted  that  the  persecution 
which  came  upon  them  in  Maryland  at  this  early  stage 
of  their  history,  was  motived,  not  by  intolerance  of  their 
religious  teachings  or  sectarian  bigotry  on  the  part  of  the 
authorities,  but  by  the  sincere  though  mistaken  concep 
tion  that  the  Quakers  were  hostile  to  government,  and 
were  inculcating  views  that  were  incompatible  with  a 

1  MS.  Letter  of  Josiah  Coale  to  George  Fox,  1660. — A.R.B.  Collection, 
No.  53. 

8  There  is  a  curious  case  of  the  prosecution  of  John  Everitt  who  ' '  ran  from 
his  colors  when  prest  to  goe  to  the  Susquehanna  Fort,  pleading  that  he  could 
not  bear  arms  for  conscience's  sake."  He  is  to  be  "  kept  in  chaynes  and  bake 
his  own  bread  "  until  the  jury  is  impanelled. — Archives  of  Maryland,  iii.  435. 

8  Josiah  Coale  to  Margaret  Fell,  Crosfield  MSS.  in  Devonshire  House. 

4  Crisp  Collection  of  MS.  No.  102. 

5  One  case,  that  of  Peter  Sharpe,  a  physician  who  owned  an  island  in  the 
Choptank  River,  will  suffice.     He  held  a  note  against  Adam  Staples  for  1700 
pounds  of  tobacco.     Because  Sharpe  refused  to  take  the  oath  of  engagement, 
Staples  petitioned  the  Court  to  annul  the  Note,  which  the  Court  did.  — Besse,  ii.  380. 


280   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

well-ordered  civil  regime.  They  were  supposed  to  be 
disrespectful  to  magistrates,  revolutionary  in  design, 
aiming  to  annul  courts  and  undermine  all  means  of 
forceful  defence. 

As  soon  as  the  solid  people  of  the  colony  discovered 
the  real  nature  of  the  new  religion  which  was  getting  a 
foothold  in  Maryland,  there  came  to  be  a  general  attitude 
of  respect  toward  it.  This  change  of  attitude  was  largely 
due  to  the  coming  of  three  great  leaders  of  the  movement 
— the  men  who  were  the  real  "  founders "  of  Quakerism 
in  the  Southern  colonies — John  Burnyeat,  George  Fox, 
and  William  Edmundson.  Burnyeat  was  the  first  of  the 
three  in  the  field.  He  arrived  in  Maryland  in  April 
1665,  coming  from  Barbadoes,  the  "nursery"  of  Western 
Quakerism,  and  he  spent  the  entire  summer  in  the 
province  of  Maryland,  travelling  and  labouring  in  the 
ministry,  holding  "  large  meetings  in  the  Lord's  power  " — 
"  Friends  were  greatly  comforted  and  several  were  con 
vinced."  l  At  the  end  of  the  summer  he  went  down  into 
Virginia,  where  he  found  much  havoc  wrought  in  the 
little  Society  by  the  "  bewitchment "  of  John  Perrot,  who 
with  his  quietistic  notions  had  led  Friends  to  "  forsake 
their  meetings "  and  to  become  "  loose  and  careless." 
Burnyeat  appears  to  have  turned  the  tide  and  saved  the 
day :  "  Friends  were  revived  and  refreshed,  and  raised 
up  into  a  service  of  life  through  the  Lord's  goodness 
and  renewed  visitation."2  He  was  back  in  Virginia  in 
1671,  with  Daniel  Gould  of  Rhode  Island  for  his  com 
panion,  and  he  now  "found  a  freshness  of  life  among 
them.  They  had  grown  up  to  a  degree  of  their  former 
zeal  and  tenderness.  I  found  a  great  openness  in  the 
country  and  had  several  blessed  meetings.  I  advised 
them  to  have  a  men's  meeting  [for  Church  business]  to 
settle  things  in  good  order  and  to  keep  things  sweet."3 

1  Burnyeat's  Journal,  p.  187.    The  sad  episode — "sore  exercise,"  he  calls  it — 
of  his  visit  in  Maryland  was  the  "fall"  and  defection  of  Thomas  Thurston,  who 
had  been  a  valiant  pioneer  in  the  early  planting  of  Quakerism  in  all  the  colonies. 
He  was,  in  an  evil  moment,  caught  and  carried  away  by  the  spurious  ' '  spiritu 
ality  "  of  Perrot's  teaching,  and  became  "  lost  to  the  truth  "  and  "  a  vagabond  as 
to  his  spiritual  condition." 

2  Ibid.  pp.  188-189.  *  MM-  P-  T99- 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    281 

He  spent  the  spring  of  1672  in  Maryland,  doing  the 
same  kind  of  constructive  work  as  he  had  done  so 
successfully  in  Virginia.  In  April  he  appointed  a  meeting 
at  West  River,  Maryland,  for  all  Friends  in  the  province 
— the  birth-date  of  Baltimore  Yearly  Meeting,  the  second 
to  be  organised  in  America — and  it  was  "  a  very  large 
meeting  which  continued  for  several  days."  Meetings  for 
men  and  for  women  were  organised  for  the  transaction 
of  business  and  "  for  the  blessed  ordering  of  the  Gospel." l 
"  Through  the  good  Providence  of  the  Lord,"  George 
Fox  landed  in  the  Patuxent  (West)  River  just  in  time  to 
attend  this  General  Meeting.  He  had  spent  six  weeks 
in  the  passage  from  Jamaica  to  Maryland — a  voyage  so 
boisterous  and  full  of  hazard  that  they  all  "  admired  the 
Providence  of  God  who  preserved  them."  Fox  notes 
with  much  satisfaction  that  "  many  people  of  considerable 
quality  in  the  world's  account "  were  at  the  great  Mary 
land  Meeting.  "  There  were  five  or  six  Justices  of  the 
Peace,  the  Speaker  of  their  parliament  or  Assembly,  one 
of  the  Council,  and  divers  others  of  note." z  This  marks 
the  turning-point,  and  from  that  time  on  Quakerism 
was  considered  an  eminently  respectable  religion  in  Lord 
Baltimore's  province.  Fox  held  another  large  meeting 
at  the  Cliffs — north  of  the  Patuxent.8  He  arrived  there 
soaked  with  water,  his  boat  having  capsized  when  he 
was  in  a  great  perspiration,  having  "  come  very  hot  out 
of  a  meeting  before,"  but  "the  Lord's  power  preserved 
[him]  from  taking  hurt,"  and  "  many  people  came  to 
the  meeting  and  received  the  truth  with  reverence."  Fox, 
with  a  large  band  of  helpers,  including  John  Burnyeat, 
"  went  over  by  boat  to  the  Eastern  shore "  of  the 
Chesapeake,  where  they  had  "a  large  and  heavenly 
meeting,"  with  "  several  persons  of  quality  and  two  Justices 
of  the  Peace  "  at  it  He  held  an  extraordinary  meeting 
with  the  "  Indian  Emperor,  his  kings  and  their  cocka- 
rooses,"  telling  them  that  "God  was  raising  up  his 
tabernacle  of  witness  in  their  wilderness  country." 

1  Journal,  pp.  199-200. 
*  Fox's  Journal,  ii.  161-163.  *  Ibid.  p.  165. 


282   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

On  his  return  journey  from  New  England — a  journey 
crowded  with  toil  and  peril  and  dramatic  happenings — 
Fox  arrived  in  Maryland  again  toward  the  end  of 
September  1672  wet  and  weary,  and  "dirtied  with  getting 
through  bogs,"  and  held  a  large  meeting  near  St  Michael's, 
where  there  were  already  many  Friends.  Here  a  judge's 
wife  came  to  the  meeting  and  declared  :  "  She  had  rather 
hear  us  once  than  a  priest  a  thousand  times ! "  In 
October  a  great  General  Meeting  "  for  all  Maryland  "  was 
held  at  Tredhaven  Creek  on  the  eastern  shore.  The 
meeting  lasted  five  days — the  first  three  days  being  for 
worship  and  preaching  and  then  two  for  church  business. 
"  Several  magistrates  with  their  wives,  many  Protestants 
of  divers  sorts,  and  some  Papists  and  persons  of  chief 
account  in  the  country,"  were  at  the  meeting.  "It  was 
thought  there  were  a  thousand  people,  and  there  were  so 
many  boats  passing  on  the  river  that  it  was  almost  like 
the  Thames  !  One  of  the  Justices  said  he  never  saw  so 
many  people  together  in  that  country  before.  It  was  a 
very  heavenly  meeting,  the  presence  of  the  Lord  was 
gloriously  manifested,  Friends  sweetly  refreshed,  people 
generally  satisfied,  and  many  convinced." l  For  a  month 
following,  Fox  was  pushing  on  from  meeting  to  meeting, 
almost  living  in  a  boat,  often  "  wet  and  weary  with 
rowing,"  but  having  "  good  service,"  "  very  large  meetings," 
giving  "  a  thundering  testimony  to  the  truth,"  convincing 
"  Justices  and  other  persons  of  quality,"  and  "  seeing  the 
truth  reach  into  the  hearts  of  the  people  beyond  words." z 

The  5th  of  November,  with  Robert  Widders,  James 
Lancaster,  and  George  Pattison,  he  sailed  away  for 
Virginia,  having  won  to  his  cause  a  very  large  number  of 
persons  of  "upper  rank,"  as  he  calls  them.  He  landed 
at  a  "  place  called  Nancemond,  about  two  hundred  miles 
from  Maryland."  The  region  of  Fox's  activity  in  Virginia 

1  Fox's  Journal,  ii.  179. 

8  Ibid.  pp.  180-183.  Among  the  places  now  visited  by  Fox  was  Severn  (now 
Annapolis)  where  there  was  such  a  crowd  that  "  no  building  would  hold  them." 
Three  Friends,  William  Cole,  William  Richards,  and  John  Gary,  writing  in  1674 
for  the  meeting  to  Friends  in  Bristol,  England,  say  :  "  Much  people  there  be  in 
our  country  that  come  to  hear  the  truth  declared  .  .  .  and  many  by  it  are 
convinced." — Bowden,  vol.  i.  381. 


CH.I   QUAKERS   IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    283 

was  the  strip  of  country  lying  between  the  James  River 
and  the  North  Carolina  border.  He  found  isolated 
Friends  scattered  through  the  district.  "  Officers  and 
magistrates  "  came  to  his  meetings  which  were  "  precious." 
Men's  and  women's  meetings  for  business  were  established. 
A  large  meeting,  too  greatly  attended  for  any  house  to 
contain  the  people,  was  held  at  Pagan  Creek,  and  "  the 
sound  of  truth  was  spread."  He  went  on  south,  through 
a  "plashy"  country,  "full  of  great  bogs  and  swamps," 
"  wet  to  the  knees,  lying  abroad  at  night  in  the  woods." 
At  Somerton  he  found  a  woman  who  "  had  a  sense  of 
God  upon  her,"  and  who  arranged  for  the  little  party  to 
sleep  on  mats  before  her  fire.  Proceeding  on  they  struck 
Bennett's  Creek  (which  he  calls  "  Bonner's  ")  and  paddled 
into  the  Chowan  River  (then  called  the  Macocomocock), 
and  down  this  river  by  canoe  into  the  regions  bordering 
on  Albemarle  Sound. 

Fox's  own  account  of  this  journey  is  quaintly  told  in 
the  manuscript  Journal  of  the  American  visit. 

"We  passed  in  a  canoe  downe  the  creek  to  Mattocomake 
River  and  came  to  Hugh  Smithick's  [Smith's]  house  and  people 
of  the  world  came  to  see  us  (for  there  were  no  Friends  in  these 
parts).  Wee  went  to  Nathaniell  Batts  house ;  he  was  formerly 
Governor  of  Roanoke  and  is  most  commonly  known  by  the 
name  of  Captaine  Batts ;  he  is  a  rude,  desperate  man  who  has 
great  command  over  yt  countrie,  especially  over  ye  Indians." 

But  as  Fox  had  been  preceded  in  this  country  by 
William  Edmundson,  and  as  the  latter  was  the  real  pioneer 
in  the  Carolinas,  I  shall  turn  aside  to  describe  Edmundson's 
path-breaking  visit.  He  was  with  Fox  at  the  Patuxent 
General  Meeting  in  1671,  and  when  the  latter  travelled 
north,  Edmundson  turned  south,  visited  Virginia,  holding 
"  powerful  meetings,"  "  settling  men's  minds  in  the  truth," 
establishing  "a  men's  meeting  for  discipline,"  and  then 
started  off  south  with  two  Friends  as  companions. 

"  It  was,"  he  writes,  "  all  wilderness  and  no  English  inhabitants 
or  padways,  only  some  marked  trees  to  guide  people ;  the  first 
day's  journey  we  did  pretty  well,  and  lay  that  night  in  the  woods, 
as  we  often  used  to  do  in  those  Parts.  The  next  Day  being  wet 


284  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

Weather  we  were  sorely  soyled  in  Swamps  and  Rivers,  and  one 
of  the  two  that  were  with  me  for  a  Guide,  was  at  a  stand  to 
know  which  way  the  Place  lay  we  were  to  go  unto :  I  perceiving 
he  was  at  a  Loss,  turn'd  my  Mind  to  the  Lord,  and  as  He  led 
me,  I  led  the  Way.  So  we  travel'd  in  many  Difficulties  until 
about  Sun-set ;  then  they  told  me,  They  could  travel  no  further ; 
for  they  both  fainted,  being  weak-spirited  Men :  I  bid  them  stay 
there,  and  kindle  a  Fire,  and  I  would  ride  a  little  farther,  for  I 
saw  a  bright  Horrizon  appear  through  the  Woods  which  Travellers 
take  as  a  Mark  of  some  Plantation ;  so  rode  on  to  it,  and  found  it 
was  only  tall  Timber  Trees  without  Underwood :  But  I  perceived 
a  small  Path,  which  I  follow'd  till  it  was  very  dark,  and  rain'd 
violently ;  then  I  alighted  and  set  my  back  to  a  Tree,  till  the 
Rain  abated :  but  it  being  dark,  and  the  Woods  thick,  I  walked 
all  Night  between  the  Trees:  and  though  very  weary,  I  durst 
not  lie  down  on  the  Ground,  for  my  Cloaths  were  wet  to  my 
Skin.  I  had  eaten  little  or  nothing  that  Day,  neither  had  I 
anything  to  refresh  me  but  the  Lord.  In  the  morning  I  return'd 
to  seek  my  two  Companions,  and  found  them  lying  by  a  great 
Fire  of  Wood :  I  told  them  how  I  had  far'd ;  he  that  should 
have  been  the  Guide  would  have  perswaded  me  that  we  were 
gone  past  the  Place  where  we  intended ;  but  my  Mind  drew  to 
the  Path  which  I  had  found  the  Night  before :  So  I  led  the  way, 
and  that  Path  brought  us  to  the  Place  where  we  intended, 
viz.  Henry  Phillip's  House  by  Albemarle  River. 

"  He  and  his  wife  had  been  convinc'd  of  the  Truth  in  New 
England,  and  came  there  to  live,  who  having  not  seen  a  Friend 
for  seven  Years  before,  they  wept  for  Joy  to  see  us :  yet  it  being 
on  a  First  Day  Morning  when  we  got  there,  although  I  was 
weary  and  faint,  and  my  Cloaths  all  wet,  I  desired  them  to  send 
to  the  People  there-away  to  come  to  a  Meeting  about  the  middle 
of  the  Day,  and  I  would  lie  down  upon  a  Bed,  and  if  I  slept  too 
long  that  they  should  awake  me.  Now  about  the  Hour 
appointed  many  People  came,  but  they  had  little  or  no  Religion, 
for  they  came  and  sate  down  in  the  Meeting  smoking  their 
Pipes ;  but  in  a  little  time  the  Lord's  Testimony  arose  in  the 
Authority  of  His  Power,  and  their  Hearts  being  reach'd  with  it, 
several  of  them  were  tender'd  and  received  the  Testimony. 
After  Meeting  they  desir'd  me  to  stay  with  them,  and  let  them 
have  more  Meetings." 1 

The  colonists  in  this  region,  with  the  exception  of 
Henry  Phillips  and  his  wife,  were  not  Friends,  and  appar 
ently,  Edmundson  says,  "had  little  or  no  religion,"  *>. 

1  Edmundson's  Journal,  pp.  58-59. 


CH.I   QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    285 

they  had  no  organised  religion,  no  church,  no  ministry, 
though  "  their  hearts  were  open  "  and  they  were  eventually 
gathered  in  in  large  numbers  into  the  Society  of  Friends. 
A  Justice  of  the  Peace  named  Francis  Toms,  who  lived 
three  miles  from  Phillips'  house,  "  received  the  truth  with 
gladness,"  and,  at  a  meeting  in  his  house,  several  more 
"  had  a  sense  of  the  power  of  God,  received  the  truth  and 
abode  in  it"1 

On  his  return  to  Virginia — a  return  journey  more 
full  of  peril  and  difficulty  than  one  ordinarily  finds 
even  in  these  biographies  of  the  Quaker  pioneers,  every 
where  crowded  with  incidents  of  extraordinary  endurance 
— Edmundson  continued  his  work  of  organising  and 
strengthening  the  meetings  for  discipline  throughout  the 
sections  of  Virginia  where  there  were  Friends.  He  visited 
the  Governor,  Sir  William  Berkeley,  but  he  found  him 
"  pevish  and  brittle." z  He,  however,  succeeded  better  with 
some  of  the  other  officials  of  the  colony.  Justice  Taverner 
and  "  several  other  persons  of  note  "  came  to  his  meetings. 
Major-General  Bennett  and  Colonel  Dewes  were  "  reached 
by  the  witness  of  God."  This  major-general,  who  had 
"  a  great  estate,"  desired  to  contribute  to  the  expenses  of 
the  Society,  and  finally  became  a  member  of  it — "  He 
was  a  brave,  solid,  wise  man.  He  received  the  truth  and 
died  in  it."8 

When  Fox  arrived  in  the  Albemarle  country  of  North 
Carolina  in  1672  he  found  a  little  Quaker  nucleus  there 
as  the  result  of  William  Edmundson's  work.  The  little 
band  of  Quaker  missionaries,  led  by  Fox,  found  a  man  on 
their  travels,  living  on  the  banks  of  the  Chowan  river,  who 
was  named  Hugh  Smith,  to  whose  house  "  people  of  other 
professions  "  came  to  see  and  hear  the  travellers.  Farther 
down  the  river  they  found  a  "  captain,"  who  was  "  very 
loving,"  and  who  lent  them  his  boat,  as  they  were  very 

1  Edmundson's  Journal,  p.  60. 

2  When  Edmundson  related  to  Major-General  Bennett  that  the  Governor  was 
"brittle  and    pevish,"  the  General  asked,    "Did  he  call  you  dog  or  rogue!" 
When  Edmundson  answered  that  he  did  not,  the  General  said,  "Then  you  took 
him  in  his  best  humor  ! " 

3  Edmundson's  Journal,  p.  63. 


286  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

wet  by  the  water  "  splashing  "  into  the  little  canoe.  With 
the  captain's  boat  they  started  off  for  the  Governor's  house 
at  Edenton,  but  they  found  the  water  so  shallow  that  "  the 
boat  would  not  swim."  "  We  were  fain  to  put  off  our 
shoes  and  stockings  and  wade  through  the  water  some 
distance.  The  Governor,  with  his  wife,  received  us 
lovingly." l  A  doctor  at  the  Governor's  house  "  would 
needs  dispute,"  and  he  denied  that  "  the  light  and  Spirit 
of  God "  was  in  every  one,  declaring  that  it  was  not  in 
Indians.  "  Whereupon,"  says  Fox,  "  I  called  an  Indian 
and  asked  him  whether  or  not  when  he  lied  or  did  wrong 
to  any,  there  was  not  something  in  him  that  reproved  him 
for  it.  He  said  that  there  was  such  a  thing  in  him  that 
did  so  reprove  him  and  make  him  ashamed.  So  we 
shamed  the  doctor  before  the  Governor  and  people." 2 
The  Governor  kept  them  all  night,  and  treated  them  very 
"  courteously."  The  party  from  here  went  by  Sound, 
about  thirty  miles,  to  the  house  of  Joseph  Scott,  who  was 
"  a  representative  of  the  country."  The  people  in  these 
parts  were  "  tender  and  much  desired  meetings."  Four 
miles  farther  on  another  meeting  was  held,  to  which  the 
Governor's  Secretary  came,  "  the  chief  Secretary  of  the 
Province,"  who  was  already  "  convinced."  On  their  way 
back  they  visited  the  house  of  the  Secretary  of  the  colony, 
had  an  illustration  of  "  the  great  power  of  God  who  carried 
them  safely  twenty-four  miles  in  a  rotten  boat,  the  water 
being  rough,  and  the  winds  high,"  and  held  a  precious 
meeting  at  Hugh  Smith's.  They  were  eighteen  days  in 
North  Carolina,  and  Fox  felt  that  they  had  "  made  an 
entrance  of  truth  upon  the  people  "  there.3  They  arrived 
on  the  nineteenth  day  of  their  travel,  "exceedingly  wet 
and  dirty,"  at  Somerton  in  Virginia,  and  lay  that  night  in 
their  clothes  by  the  fire  at  the  home  of  the  woman  who 
"  had  a  sense  of  God  upon  her,"  and  on  the  morrow  they 
had  a  "  good  meeting "  with  the  people  about  Somerton 
who  "  had  a  great  desire  to  hear." 4 

The  territory  covered  by  this  early  missionary  activity 

1  Fox's  Journal,  ii.  185.  a  Ibid.  ii.  185. 

»  Ibid.  ii.  1 86.  *  Ibid.  ii.  187. 


CH.I   QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    287 

of  Edmundson  and  Fox  in  North  Carolina  comprises 
the  three  present  counties  of  Chowan,  Perquimans,  and 
Pasquotank.  The  increase  from  these  "  beginnings  "  was 
evidently  rapid,  for  Governor  Henderson  Walker,  writing 
to  the  Bishop  of  London  in  1703,  says  :  "  George  Fox  .  .  . 
did  infuse  the  Quaker  principles  into  some  small  number 
of  the  people,  which  did  and  hath  continued  to  grow  ever 
since  very  numerous," l  and  William  Gordon,  writing  to 
the  secretary  of  the  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the 
Gospel  in  1709,  says:  "There  are  few  or  no  dissenters 
in  this  Government  but  Quakers.  .  .  .  Some  of  the  most 
ancient  inhabitants,  after  George  Fox  went  over,  did  turn 
Quakers." 2  This  missionary  effort  along  the  Albemarle 
was  the  first  organised  effort  of  any  kind  to  carry  the 
religion  of  Christ  into  North  Carolina.  No  Episcopal 
minister  had  yet  come  to  the  colony,  and  no  dissenting 
ministers  appeared  in  this  field  before  Fox  and  Edmundson. 
They  were,  therefore,  in  more  senses  than  one,  "  path- 
breakers,"  as  they  pushed  through  the  southern  wilderness 
and  answered  the  "  great  desire  "  of  the  people.8 

George  Fox  spent  a  short  time  in  Virginia,  having 
"  many  large  and  precious  meetings,  to  which  a  great 
many  magistrates,  officers,  and  other  high  people  came." 
"  The  people  were  wonderfully  affected,"  "  the  power  of 
the  Lord  was  gloriously  seen  and  felt,"  and  "  a  victory 
was  got  over  the  bad  spirit  which  was  in  some  " — evidently 
the  remaining  leaven  of  the  Perrot  movement  which  died 
hard.4  Having  finished  "  the  service  that  lay  upon  him  " 
in  Virginia,  Fox  set  sail  in  "  an  open  sloop  "  for  Maryland. 
The  voyage  was  unusually  tempestuous ;  they  were  a 
good  deal  of  the  time  "  completely  wet "  and  almost  frozen 
with  cold,  for  it  was  in  January.  Part  of  the  time  Fox 
himself  sat  at  the  helm  and  steered  the  sloop,  but  as  soon 
as  they  reached  the  Patuxent  the  "  precious  meetings " 

1  Colonial  Records  of  North  Carolina,  i.  571. 

2  Ibid.  pp.  708-710. 

8  For  further  evidence  that  the  Quakers  brought  the  first  message  of  Christianity 
to  North  Carolina  see  Dr.  Weeks's  Religious  Development  of  North  Carolina, 
Baltimore,  1892. 

4  Journal,  ii.  187-188. 


288   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  ni 

began  again,  and  the  people  were  "  convinced."  This 
third  visit  of  Fox  to  Maryland  (covering  the  period  from  the 
3rd  of  January  to  the  2ist  of  May  1673)  was  probably  the 
most  effective  and  constructive  work  of  his  entire  American 
tour.  He  was  at  the  very  height  of  his  efficiency  as  a 
preacher  and  organiser.  His  physical  endurance  seemed 
unlimited.  He  was  almost  continuously  in  a  boat  when 
not  holding  a  meeting,  often  rowing  himself.  He  held 
meetings  in  barns,  in  tobacco  houses,  in  Friends'  houses, 
and  in  the  wigwams  of  the  Indians — the  weather  being 
mostly  too  cold  for  out-door  meetings.  He  had  as  usual 
an  eye  for  public  officials  and  "high  people,"  and  the 
meetings  of  this  period  saw  the  convincement  of  "a 
great  many  people  of  account  in  the  world " — justices, 
magistrates,  majors,  captains,  and  "  divers  others  of 
considerable  account  in  the  government."  Just  before 
sailing  for  England  he  attended  another  great  General 
Meeting  for  the  whole  of  Maryland,  at  which  "  many 
things  were  opened  for  edification  and  comfort,"  and  the 
organisation  was  put  into  permanent  working  condition. 
"  Parting  in  great  tenderness,  in  the  sense  of  the  heavenly 
life,"  Fox  sailed  away  for  Bristol,  leaving  behind  a  strong 
group  of  Friends  stretching,  with  some  breaks,  from  the 
coast  of  New  Hampshire  to  Albemarle  Sound  in  the 
Carolinas,  and  having  accomplished  a  piece  of  colonial 
missionary  labour  which,  so  far  as  I  know,  no  visitor  to 
America  in  colonial  times  paralleled.1  From  a  letter 
written  in  1674  by  three  Virginia  Friends  to  Bristol 
Monthly  Meeting  in  England,  we  learn  that  George  Fox's 
labours  had  borne  great  fruit.  "  Our  meetings  are  at  this 
time  more  than  doubled,  and  a  large  convincement  is 
upon  many  who  as  yet  stand  off"  \i,e.  do  not  join  in 
membership].2 

In  1676-77  the  Southern  colonies  received  another 
extensive  visit  from  William  Edmundson,  whose  wilderness 
travels  on  this  visit  reach  about  the  climax  of  hardship 

1  In  the  MS.  Journal  of  Fox's  American  journey  he  estimates  that  he  travelled 
16,149  miles. 

2  Bowden,  i.  356. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS   IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    289 

and  difficulty.      One  sample  of  the  sort  of  thing  he  went 
through  will  perhaps  be  sufficient : 

"  It  was  very  cold,  foul  weather  [on  the  Patuxent  river],  sleet 
and  snow,  and  we  were  all  day  and  most  of  the  night  before  we 
got  to  the  place  intended.  When  we  got  to  shore  I  could  neither 
go  nor  stand,  except  as  two  bore  me  up,  one  by  each  arm,  I  had 
such  pains  and  weakness  in  my  back  and  groins  with  piercing 
cold.  .  .  .  We  were  forced  to  stay  three  nights  on  a  small  island,  the 
weather  being  foul  and  stormy.  We  had  no  shelter  but  the  open 
skies,  the  wet  ground  to  lie  on.  This  augmented  my  cold  and 
pain,  but  the  Lord  bore  up  my  spirit,  and  enabled  me  to  bear  it." 1 

He  found  the  "  affairs  of  truth "  a  good  deal  out  of 
order  in  Virginia — "  there  were  many  unruly  spirits  to 
deal  with,  but  I  had  good  service  and  success."  It  was 
the  period  of  the  Bacon  Rebellion,  and  the  "  country  was 
in  great  trouble,"  but  "  Friends  kept  clear." 

Then  follows  in  the  Journal  a  notable  passage  that 
reveals  the  spirit  in  which  these  Quaker  missionaries  did 
their  work : 

"  Now  I  was  moved  of  the  Lord  to  go  to  Carolina,  and  it  was 
perilous  travelling,  for  the  Indians  were  not  yet  subdued,  but  did 
mischief,  and  murdered  several.  The  place  they  haunted  much 
was  in  that  wilderness  betwixt  Virginia  and  Carolina ;  scarce  any 
durst  travel  that  way  unarmed.  Friends  endeavoured  to  dissuade 
me  from  going,  ...  so  I  delayed  some  time.  In  the  meantime  I 
appointed  a  meeting  on  the  north  side  of  the  James  River,  where 
none  had  been,  and  there  came  several  Friends  a  great  way  in 
boats.  There  came  also  the  widow  Holland's  eldest  son,  with 
whom  I  walked  near  two  miles  the  night  before  the  meeting, 
advising  him  about  some  disorders  in  the  family,  and  so  we 
parted ;  .  .  .  but  before  morning  a  messenger  came  to  tell  me  that 
the  young  man  was  dead.  Then  the  word  of  the  Lord  came  to 
me,  saying :  '  All  lives  are  in  my  hand,  and  if  thou  goest  not  to 
Carolina,  thy  life  is  as  this  young  man's;  but  if  thou  goest,  I 
will  give  thee  thy  life  for  a  prey.'  .  .  .  The  next  day  I  made  ready 
for  my  journey,  but  none  durst  venture  with  me,  save  one  ancient 
man,  a  Friend."  2 

He  had  "many  precious  meetings"  along  the  Albemarle, 
revisited  his  old  Friends  who  were  convinced  on  the  former 
visit,  saw  "several  turned  to  the  Lord,"  and  found  the 

1  Journal,  pp.  97-98.  *  Ibid.  pp.  99-100. 

U 


290  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

people  generally  "  tender  and  loving."  "  There  was  no 
room,"  he  writes,  "for  priests  [i.e.  paid  ministers],  for 
Friends  were  finely  settled,  and  I  left  things  well  amongst 
them " — and  the  old  soldier  in  both  kinds  of  warfare 
turned  his  face  homeward,  never  again  to  help  "  settle 
truth's  affairs  "  in  the  colonies  where  he  had  laboured  so 
faithfully  to  plant  Quakerism. 

There  was  another  period  of  Quaker  suffering  in 
Virginia  between  1675  and  the  accession  in  1680  of 
Lord  Culpepper  to  the  Governorship,  who  was  inclined  to 
spare  the  Quakers.  Under  date  of  I  $th  June  1675,  the 
record  states  that  "  The  Hon'ble  Governor  being  informed 
that  there  are  several  conventicles  [of  the  Quakers]  in 
Nansemond  county,  it  is  ordered  by  this  court  that  they 
be  proceeded  against  according  to  the  laws  of  England 
and  this  country,"  and  the  Justices  of  the  lower  counties 
of  Virginia  were  instructed  to  make  strict  inquiry,  and  to 
proceed  against  any  person  who  meets  in  a  conventicle. 

There  are,  too,  definite  entries  of  fines  against  persons 
who  have  refused  to  have  their  children  baptized,  or  who 
have  "  suffered  meetings  of  Quakers  at  their  houses,"  or 
who  have  been  "  living  as  man  and  wife  without  legal 
marriage,"  i.e.  who  have  married  according  to  Friends 
rules.1  The  Friends  in  Maryland  endeavoured  to  assist 
their  suffering  brethren  in  Virginia  during  this  period, 
and  under  direction  of  the  Meeting  at  Tredhaven,  in 
December  1690,  William  Berry  and  Stephen  Keddy 
undertook  the  service  of  relieving  the  sad  state  and 
condition  of  the  Church  in  Virginia.2 

For  a  hundred  years  after  the  first  planting  of  Quaker 
ism  in  Virginia,  Maryland,  and  the  Carolinas — that  is, 
from  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  to  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century — it  continued  to  grow  and  expand 
with  some  eddies  and  backwashes.  There  was  here,  as  in 
New  England,  an  almost  unbroken  succession  of  itinerant 
preachers  who  year  after  year  visited  all  the  Quaker 
centres  in  their  rounds  and  often  broke  new  ground  and 

1  Weeks,  Southern  Quakerism  and  Slavery,  pp.  43-45. 
2  Janney,  History  of  Friends ,  ii.  359. 


CH.I    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    291 

so  formed  new  centres.  Whenever  a  prominent  Friend 
migrated  to  a  pioneer  locality  he  carried  his  Quakerism 
with  him  as  he  did  his  household  stuff,  and  his  house  was 
likely  to  become  the  centre  of  a  new  Quaker  church. 
The  itinerant  ministers  in  their  travels  found  their  way  to 
the  homes  of  these  isolated  Friends,  and  on  their  arrival  a 
meeting  was  sure  to  be  appointed  for  the  neighbourhood, 
and  if  "  convincements  "  were  made,  as  generally  happened, 
the  "  circle "  would  increase  and  become  a  "  meeting." 
The  Journals  of  these  itinerant  workers  show  the  steady 
increase  of  the  Quaker  Society  during  the  century,  as  I 
have  indicated.  The  most  important  of  these  Journals 
for  tracing  the  growth  and  life  of  the  Society  are  those  of 
Thomas  Story,  Thomas  Chalkley,  Samuel  Bownas,  John 
Fothergill,  and  John  Richardson.  A  few  illustrations  from 
Thomas  Story's  Journal  will  be  sufficient  to  show  the 
type  of  work  done  by  these  travellers  at  the  close  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  the  date  of  the  following  itinerant 
service  being  1698.  Thomas  Story  and  his  companion 
Roger  Gill  sailed  up  the  York  River,  Virginia,  the 
nth  of  February,  and  held  their  first  meeting  at  the 
house  of  Edward  Thomas — "  a  Friend  who  was  zealous 
for  Truth  " — at  Bangor  House  on  Queen  Creek  :  "  Several 
who  were  not  Friends  were  tendered,  and  this  was  the 
first  fruit  of  our  ministry  in  this  country."  On  the  I5th, 
a  meeting  was  held  sixteen  miles  from  Bangor  House,  at 
Daniel  Akehurst's  on  Warwick  River — "  a  good  meeting." 1 
Next  day  they  were  at  Martin's  Hundred  at  the  house  of 
Robert  Perkins.  On  the  2ist,  a  meeting  was  held  at 
Scimmins  [spelled  many  ways  in  the  Journals'}  in  York 
county,  "  where  no  meeting  had  been  before,"  and  "  John 
Bates  and  his  wife  were  convinced  of  Truth" — a  very 
important  "  convincement."  The  next  day  Story  was 
back  at  Bangor  House  where  William  Clayborn,  captain 
of  the  militia,  grandson  of  the  famous  Colonel  Clayborn, 
was  won  to  the  Quaker  cause.  "  At  the  foot  of  Queen's 
Creek,"  Thomas  Gary  and  Miles  Gary  and  their  families 
"  were  comforted,  having  been  lately  convinced."  Across 

1  We  shall  hear  of  this  Daniel  Akehurst  later  as  a  man  of  note. 


292  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

the  James  River  at  Chuckatuck,  Thomas  Story  visited  the 
old  Massachusetts  hero  of  persecution,  "  our  ancient  Friend 
John  Copeland,  the  first  of  those  who  had  their  ears  cut 
in  New  England  for  the  testimony  of  Truth."  "  At  my 
request,"  Story  says,  "  he  showed  us  his  right  ear  ! "  The 
Friends  of  the  neighbourhood  came  in  and  they  had 
together  "a  tender  season  of  God's  love."  Meetings 
followed  at  Derasconeck,  Western  Branch  [of  James 
River],  "  where  several  confessed  Truth";  Southern  Branch, 
"  where  the  Grace  of  God  was  plentiful,  the  people  were 
tendered,  and  the  meeting  was  in  the  dominion  of  Truth  "  ; 
and  at  Barbican,  "the  last  meeting  in  Virginia  toward 
Carolina."  In  this  town  was  a  "priest  \i.e.  established 
minister]  who,  being  taken  with  an  infirmity  in  his  tongue 
and  limbs,  had  not  preached  much  for  five  years,  and  the 
people,  being  just  to  their  own  interest,  paid  him  only 
as  often  as  he  exercised  his  faculty !  They  gave  him  a 
hogshead  of  tobacco  for  every  sermon,  but  no  sermon  no 
tobacco." 

From  here  the  travellers  (Nathan  Newby  of  Virginia 
going  as  companion)  passed  down  into  North  Carolina, 
"through  a  wilderness,  there  being  no  house  in  all  that 
way ;  we  ate  bread  and  cheese  and  drank  of  the  brook." 
At  the  head  of  Perquimans  Creek  they  came  to  the  house 
of  Francis  Toms,  "  who  was  one  of  the  Provincial  Council  " 
— evidently  William  Edmundson's  convert.  They  had  a 
large  meeting,  "  several  persons  of  note  "  attending,  after 
which  they  were  entertained  by  the  lieutenant-governor 
of  the  colony.  Prominent  Friends  mentioned  in  this 
region  are  Thomas  Simons,  Henry  White,  Gabriel  Newby, 
Stephen  Scott,  and  Anne  Wilson. 

On  his  northward  passage  through  Virginia,  Thomas 
Story  had  very  successful  meetings  in  the  old  centres  and 
in  some  new  ones,  and  we  get  a  good  glimpse  of  the  wide 
extent  of  Quaker  influence.  "  At  Pagan  Creek,"  he  writes, 
"  we  had  a  large  assembly,  most  of  whom  were  not  Friends, 
and  the  power  of  the  Lord  was  gloriously  with  us."  The 
visitors  were  in  most  places  "  treated  with  beer  and  wine," 
or  "  had  a  little  cyder  "  or  "  punch  made  of  drams,  sugar 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    293 

and  nutmeg  in  horn  cups,"  nobody  yet  having  any 
scruple  about  such  things.  The  places  mentioned  where 
meetings  were  held  are  Chuckatuck,  Elizabeth  River, 
Elizabeth  Town,  Southern  Branch,  Levy  Neck,  Lion's 
Creek,  Burleigh  (where  James  John  was  the  leading  Friend), 
Curies,  Black  Creek,  Mattapany  River,  Powmunky  Neck 
(where  Captain  Clayborn  had  his  plantation, "  in  a  wilder 
ness  region  every  way  "  and  where  "  several  were  tendered  "). 
At  Hickory  Neck,  where  no  meeting  had  ever  been  before, 
a  large  gathering  was  held — "  some  people  were  tendered 
though  a  few  persons  were  airy ! "  At  York  City  they 
held  "  the  first  meeting  of  Friends  that  had  been  there  " 
— "the  people  were  rude  and  senseless  of  good."  At 
Pocoson,  "  where  there  had  never  been  a  meeting  before," 
there  was  a  "  divine  shining  of  the  Light."  At  Kickatan, 
"  things  of  great  moment  were  opened,"  and  "  the  daughter 
of  that  unhappy  apostate,  George  Keith  "  was  brought  to 
"  gentle  tears  "  and  hope  was  raised  "  that  she  might  be 
restored  to  the  Truth."  At  a  great  meeting  at  Remuncock 
"  many  persons  of  note  in  those  parts  "  attended,  among 
them  Major  Palmer,  Captain  Clayborn,  and  Dr.  Walker, 
"  all  of  whom  were  sedate  and  some  broken." 

His  travels  in  Maryland  were  not  so  extensive  as  in 
the  colonies  farther  south,  since  he  had  the  opportunity 
of  attending  the  Yearly  Meeting  for  Maryland  where  he 
met  most  of  the  Friends  of  that  Colony. 

It  was  held  on  the  Western  Shore,  and  was  "  very  full  " 
and  for  two  days  "  peaceable,"  "  the  good  presence  of  the 
Lord  in  it,"  but  on  the  third  day  there  occurred  a  furious 
discussion  with  two  "  priests,"  and  all  the  issues  between 
the  established  church  and  the  Quakers  were  threshed 
over.  Naturally  Thomas  Story  felt  that  "  the  invisible 
Truth  came  over  their  lofty  and  self-confident  heads,"  and 
he  reports  with  satisfaction  that  "several  Justices  who 
were  present  expressed  their  sentiments  altogether  in  our 
favour." l  We  learn  from  Story's  Journal  that  the  "  only 

1  A  good  illustration  of  the  popular  interest  which  was  aroused  by  such  dis 
cussions  appears  in  Story's  account  of  his  next  visit  to  the  Western  Shore  a  year 
later.  A  ' '  priest "  came  to  the  meeting  for  a  discussion.  He  was  on  horseback  ; 
Thomas  Story  stood  on  a  bench  outside  the  meeting-house,  a  large  company 


294  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

ministering  Friend  at  that  time  in  all  those  parts  "  [the 
Western  Shore  of  Maryland]  was  Anne  Galloway,  who 
was  "  an  honest,  innocent,  lively,  and  honourable  Friend 
in  the  Truth  who  was  everywhere  acceptable  in  her 
service." l 

Samuel  Bownas  gives  one  or  two  interesting  glimpses 
of  Southern  Quakerism  in  the  eighteenth  century,  the 
date  of  his  visit  being  1726. 

"  The  Yearly  Meeting  in  Maryland,"  he  says,  "is  held  four  days, 
three  for  worship  and  one  for  business.  Many  people  resort  to 
it  and  transact  a  deal  of  trade  one  with  another,  so  that  it  is  a 
kind  of  market  or  change,  where  captains  of  ships  or  planters 
meet  and  settle  their  affairs;  and  this  draws  abundance  of 
people  of  the  best  rank  to  it !  "  2 

He  gives  a  valuable  passage  for  the  light  it  throws  on 
colonial  travel : 

"  I  met  a  Friend  from  London,  his  name  was  Joshua  Fielding, 
who  had  visited  Virginia  and  South  Carolina,  and  had  travelled 
by  land  about  five  hundred  miles  in  three  weeks,  mostly  alone, 
a  difficult  and  hazardous  attempt,  but  he  got  through  safe  though 
he  had  no  provision  but  what  he  carried  with  him,  and  met 
with  but  about  four  or  five  houses  or  plantations  in  all  the  five 
hundred  miles  travel  [from  South  Carolina  to  Virginia]  which 
obliged  him  to  lodge  in  the  woods  frequently.  Having  a  small 
pocket-compass  it  was  his  guide,  when  sun  and  stars  were  hid 
from  him."8 

It  was  through  just  such  faith  and  pluck  and  tireless 
effort  that  Quakerism  was  planted  in  this  long  stretch  of 
coast  from  the  Eastern  Shore  of  the  Chesapeake  to 
Charleston,  South  Carolina. 

Edmund  Peckover,  who  travelled  extensively  through 
the  Southern  Colonies  in  1742,  gives  many  interesting 
glimpses  of  life  and  religious  conditions  as  they  were  at 
this  time.  He  is  on  the  whole  impressed  with  tendencies 

gathered  round,  when  to  the  discomfiture  of  the  priest  a  woman  shouted  :  "You 
refused  to  baptize  my  five  children,  unless  I  would  give  a  hogshead  of  tobacco 
for  each  one  of  them.  Now  I  don't  care  one  farthing  for  your  baptism."  The 
service  "  ended  in  divine  peace  and  consolation." — Story,  p.  229. 

1  I  have   drawn    my  information    from    pp.    153-176   of   Thomas   Story's 
Journal,  edition  of  1747. 

2  Bownas's  Journal,  p.  140.  *  Ibid.  p.  139. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    295 

toward  decline  in  spiritual  life  and  power  of  Quakerism  in 
Maryland.  He  laments  that  many  worthy  Friends  in  the 
Choptank  region  of  Maryland  have  recently  died  and 
that  "  many  of  their  offspring  come  very  far  short  of  them  " 
— few  even  keep  up  "  the  outward  appearances  "  ;  but  he 
prophesies  that  "  a  good  visitation  hangs  over  their  head." 
Spiritual  affairs  are,  he  thinks,  "  at  a  low  ebb "  in  the 
other  parts  of  Maryland — the  offspring  of  the  "antient 
worthies  "  are  as  "  gaudy  and  fine  in  their  apparel  as  any 
who  go  under  our  name  either  at  London  or  Bristol!" 
He  finds  a  much  more  encouraging  state  of  affairs  in 
Virginia — "a  good  visitation  has  been  extended  to  the 
inhabitants  of  those  parts  " ;  Friends  "  are  growing  in  the 
Best  Sense  and  have  several  ministers  among  them." l 
He  was,  too,  favourably  impressed  with  North  Carolina. 
He  found  five  meeting-houses  in  the  compass  of  thirty 
miles  with  large  meetings  and  "  many  solid,  weighty,  good 
Friends."  "  Six  or  seven  hundred  persons  attend  these 
meetings,  and  there  are  nine  or  ten  persons  gifted  in 
ministry,  with  more  developing." 2 

During  the  last  half-century  of  the  colonial  period — 
roughly  from  1725  to  1775 — there  occurred  a  large  and 
very  influential  migration  of  Friends  from  Pennsylvania 
and  colonies  farther  north,  especially  from  Nantucket  in 
New  England,  to  the  Southern  Colonies.  It  is  difficult  to 
discover  the  reasons  for  this  extensive  shifting  of  popula 
tion  in  a  country  not  at  all  thickly  settled,  but  it  was 
probably  due  in  the  last  analysis  to  economic  reasons. 
In  any  case  it  was  this  migration  of  solid  Quaker  families, 
building  a  chain  of  flourishing  meetings  across  Maryland 
and  Virginia  and  down  into  North  Carolina,  that  began  a 
new  epoch  for  Quakerism  in  these  colonies,  and  prepared 
the  way  for  the  powerful  migration  of  Quakers  to  the 
west  during  the  next  century. 

The  movement  began  with  the  migration  of  a  group  of 

1  The  places  visited  in  Virginia  by  Peckover  were  Caroline,  Cedar  Creek, 
Swamp  Meeting,  Black  Creek,  Wain  Oak,  Surry,  Pagan  Creek,  West  Branch, 
Nansemond,  Chuckatuck,  Blackwater,  Notaway,  Burleigh,  Warwick,  Curies, 
and  Genitee. 

8  Journal  of  Friends  Historical  Society,  \.  96-99. 


296  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

Friends  from  Salem,  New  Jersey,  and  another  group  from 
Nottingham,  Pennsylvania,  to  the  country  along  the 
Monocacy  River,  a  tributary  of  the  Potomac,  in  Mary 
land.  Sometime  before  1730  a  meeting,  called  "  Mono- 
quesy,"  was  formed  in  this  region,  near  the  present  village 
of  Buckeystown.  This  was  the  first  migration  of  Friends 
toward  the  west  and  away  from  the  navigable  waters,  a 
movement  which  has  ever  since  continued.  In  1732 
a  migration  southward  was  undertaken  by  Alexander 
Ross  and  a  company  of  Pennsylvania  and  Maryland 
Friends,  who  secured  from  the  Governor  and  Council  of 
Virginia  one  hundred  thousand  acres  of  land  for  a  colony 
on  Opequan  Creek,  another  tributary  to  the  Potomac. 
This  led  to  the  formation  of  two  meetings,  Opequan  and 
Providence,  which  were  formed  into  Hopewell  Monthly 
Meeting  in  I735.1  In  1745  Fairfax  Monthly  Meeting 
was  established  in  what  was  then  Fairfax  County,  but 
now  Loudoun  County.2  From  this  beginning  the  move 
ment  spread  southward,  frequently  increased  by  large 
migration  from  Pennsylvania,  until  there  were  twenty 
meetings  for  worship,  five  monthly  meetings,  and  one 
quarterly  meeting  in  this  section  of  Virginia.  A  south 
ward  movement  continued,  and  from  the  middle  of  the 
century  onward  meetings  sprang  up  in  the  south-central 
counties  of  Virginia.  One  of  the  most  interesting  episodes 
of  this  Quaker  expansion  in  Virginia  during  the  middle 
years  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  the  formation  of  a 
Quaker  centre  at  Lynchburg,  due  to  the  pioneer  work  of 
Charles  Lynch  and  his  wife  (Ann  Terrell)  of  Cedar  Creek 
Meeting.  They  were  married  in  1755,  and  pushed  out 
from  home  to  settle  a  large  tract  of  unoccupied  land  in 
the  beautiful  region  about  the  present  city  of  Lynchburg. 
The  Indians  broke  up  the  little  meeting  which  Lynch 
and  his  wife  started ;  but,  undaunted,  the  devoted  pioneers 
took  the  meeting  to  their  own  house,  and  went  bravely 
and  tactfully  to  work  to  change  the  attitude  of  the 

1  This  was  for  some  years  called  Opequan  Monthly  Meeting. 

2  All  the  Meetings  mentioned  above  belonged,  until  1789,  to  Chester  Quarterly 
Meeting  in  Pennsylvania. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS   IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    297 

Indians    from    one    of  hostility    to    one    of   peace    and 
fellowship. 

The  same  current  of  migration  pushed  farther  on,  and 
brought  fresh  streams  of  Quakerism  into  North  Carolina. 
It  was  this  influx  of  families  from  the  north  that  builded 
the  Quaker  meetings  in  Alamance,  Chatham,  Guilford, 
Randolph,  and  Surry  counties,  and  gave  Quakerism  in 
the  south  and  west  future  promise  and  increased  spiritual 
power.  One  of  the  most  important  Quaker  settlements 
which  this  migration  brought  about  was  that  at  New 
Garden  in  Guilford  County.  It  was  begun  about  1750, 
and  the  monthly  meeting  of  that  name  was  established 
in  1754.  Between  1754  and  1770,  eighty-six  Friends 
became  members  of  this  monthly  meeting  by  migration  to 
this  section  of  North  Carolina.  Of  these,  forty-five  came 
from  Pennsylvania,  thirty-five  from  Virginia,  one  from 
Maryland,  and  four  from  north-eastern  North  Carolina.1 

The  migrations  from  Nantucket  were  of  later  date, 
and  were  even  more  numerous.  The  first  date  in  the 
minutes  of  New  Garden  Monthly  Meeting  for  the  latter  is 
1771.  After  that  time  the  records  abound  in  names  ever 
since  then  familiar  in  the  annals  of  North  Carolina  Yearly 
Meeting,  and  also  in  those  Yearly  Meetings  of  the  West 
which  were  largely  composed  of  Friends,  who,  during  the 
anti-slavery  agitation  and  the  distressing  period  just 
before  the  Civil  War,  emigrated  to  the  free  soil  beyond  the 
Ohio  River.  Within  a  period  of  five  years  there  were  no 
less  than  forty-one  certificates  from  Nantucket  in  New 
Garden  Monthly  Meeting  alone,  and  other  Friends  settled 
within  the  limits  of  Cane  Creek  Monthly  Meeting.  Many 
of  these  were  young  unmarried  men,  who  were  seeking  to 
improve  their  fortunes.  The  island  of  Nantucket  was 
crowded,  two-thirds  of  its  population  being  Friends — and 
its  hardy  sons  were  ready  for  adventure  and  pioneer  life. 
In  many  instances  they  secured  the  latter  without  a 
corresponding  increase  in  estate,  and  moved  on  into 

1  Weeks's  Southern  Quakerism  and  Slavery,  p.  105.  For  further  details  of 
this  migration  see  Weeks,  op.  cit.  pp.  96-108  ;  Janney's  History  of  Friends,  iii. 
248-249  ;  and  Life  and  Labours  of  William  Reckitt. 


298   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

South  Carolina  and  Georgia  to  found  settlements  and 
meetings  which  have  entirely  vanished.  The  minutes 
abound  in  declarations  of  intentions  of  marriage,  and 
these  Nantucket  men  were  soon  united  with  daughters  of 
Pennsylvania,  and  from  these  two  sources  in  the  main  is 
the  birthright  membership  of  North  Carolina  Yearly 
Meeting  derived.  There  was  also  some  admixture  of  Welsh 
and  German  blood.  This  migration  came  simultane 
ously  with  what  is  known  as  the  Scotch- Irish  migration. 
Through  this  channel  the  strong  Presbyterian  element 
which  has  since  existed  in  Central  Carolina  was  introduced. 

These  two  influences,  in  many  respects  diverse,  were 
thus  simultaneously  established  on  Southern  soil.  They 
continued  to  exist  side  by  side  with  little  friction  until  the 
outbreak  of  the  Civil  War.  At  that  time  the  question  of 
slavery  forced  an  antagonism  which  the  War  of  the 
Revolution  did  not  engender.  The  Scotch- Irish  were 
ready  to  fight.  The  Friends  maintained  their  principle 
of  peace,  and  abstained  from  participation  in  politics, 
contenting  themselves  with  the  rigorous  insistence  upon 
the  rules  of  discipline,  educational  and  business  affairs, 
leaving  the  others  pretty  much  in  political  authority. 

There  is  little  definite  light  available  on  the  early 
settlement  of  Quakerism  in  South  Carolina.  The  first 
public  document  referring  to  the  coming  of  the  Quakers 
to  the  Southern  Colony  is  a  letter  written  by  Lord 
Shaftesbury,  June  9,  1675,  to  Andrew  Percivall  on  the 
Ashley  River.  The  letter  is  as  follows  : 

"  There  is  coming  in  my  Dogger  [small  ship],  Jacob  Waite 
and  too  or  three  other  familys  of  those  who  are  called  Quakers. 
These  are  but  Harbengers  of  a  great  number  that  intend  to 
follow.  Tis  their  purpose  to  take  up  a  whole  colony  for  them 
selves  and  theire  Friends.  I  have  writ  to  the  Governor  and 
Councell  about  them  and  directed  them  to  set  them  out  12,000 
acres.  I  would  have  you  be  very  kind  to  them  and  give  them 
all  the  assistance  you  can  in  a  choice  of  place  or  anything  else 
that  may  conduce  to  theire  convenient  settlement.  For  they 
are  people  I  have  great  regard  to  and  am  obliged  to  care  of.  I 
am  your  affectionate  friend,  SHAFTESBURY."  l 

1  Collections  of  Historical  Society  of  South  Carolina,  v.  464. 


CH.  i   QUAKERS   IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    299 

Some  letters  from  John  Jennings  of  Barbadoes  to 
Edward  Mayo  and  Jonathan  Fitts  of  South  Carolina, 
written  1679,  have  recently  come  to  light,  showing  that 
the  Barbadoes  Quaker  had  sent  five  slaves  to  the  Carolina 
Quakers.  He  asks  his  correspondents  to  return  one  of 
the  "  negromen,"  and  to  sell  the  rest  for  "  Porke  or 
Tobacco  or  bills  of  exchange,"  though  he  says,  "  if  I  had 
been  sensible  of  what  I  now  am  [sensible  of]  I  should  not 
a  sent  them  to  that  place." l 

In  1 68 1  George  Fox,  by  epistle,  endeavoured  to  bring 
the  Friends  in  South  Carolina  into  organic  relation  with 
the  North  Carolina  Friends.  He  wrote  : 

"If  you  of  Ashley  River  [S.C.]  and  you  of  Albemarle  [N.C.] 
had  once  a  year,  or  once  a  half-year,  a  meeting  together  some 
where  in  the  middle  of  the  country,  it  might  be  well."  2 

But  the  distance  between  the  two  settlements  and  the 
difficulties  of  travel  made  a  union  of  forces  impossible. 
We  get  a  slight  glimpse  of  these  Charleston  Friends  in 
1713  from  Thomas  Chalkley's  Journal : 

"  After  a  month  at  sea  "  [in  passage  from  Philadelphia]  he 
writes,  "  it  pleased  God  that  we  arrived  at  Charleston  in  South 
Carolina.  We  had  a  meeting  there  and  divers  others  afterwards. 
There  were  but  few  Friends  in  this  province,  yet  I  had  several 
meetings  in  the  country.  The  people  were  generally  loving, 
and  received  me  kindly.  .  .  .  The  longer  I  staid  the  larger  our 
meetings  were."3 

He  visited  the  Governor,  who  said  that  he  "  deserved 
encouragement"  in  his  mission. 

As  the  country  grew  in  population  Friends  about 
Albemarle  Sound  gradually  pushed  south,  and  a  chain  of 
meetings  was  formed  down  the  coast  of  North  Carolina. 
Core  Monthly  Meeting  was  established  in  1733  in 
Carteret  County,  and  Falling  Creek  Monthly  Meeting 
was  set  up  in  what  is  now  Lenoir  County  in  1748. 
Weeks  says  that  by  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century 
there  were  probably  Quaker  Meetings  for  worship  in 

1  Journal  of  Friends  Historical  Society,  vii.  65-66. 
2  Bowden,  L  413.  3  Journal,  p.  80. 


300  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

Hyde,  Beaufort,  Craven,  Carteret,  Jones,  Bladen,  and 
Lenoir  counties,1  so  that  the  great  gap  between  the 
Quaker  settlements  in  the  two  Carolinas  was  fast  closing 
up.  But  Quakerism  never  flourished  in  the  great  Southern 
Colony.  Mary  Peasley  (afterwards  Mary  Neale)  and 
Catherine  Peyton  (afterwards  Philips)  visited  Charleston 
in  1753,  and  found  a  group  of  Friends  there  "who  walk 
in  the  sight  of  their  own  eyes  and  the  imagination  of 
their  own  hearts,  without  being  accountable  to  any  for 
their  conduct."  2 

Samuel  Fothergill  was  at  Charleston  in  1755,  and 
he  writes  :  "  I  am  here  amongst  a  poor  handful  of 
professors,  and  I  believe  I  must  visit  all  their  families."  3 

But  there  was  one  Quaker  in  South  Carolina  who  did 
not  "  walk  in  the  sight  of  her  own  eyes,  nor  in  the  light 
of  her  own  imagination,"  and  she  was  no  mere  "  professor." 
This  was  Sophia  Hume,  a  native  of  the  Province,  a  grand 
daughter  of  Mary  Fisher  of  Boston  fame,  a  person  of  some 
refinement  and  culture,  and  a  woman  of  very  unusual 
religious  experience,  who,  in  1747,  issued  An  Exhortation 
to  the  Inhabitants  of  South  Carolina*  The  book  was 
written  under  a  powerful  sense  of  compulsion — "  I  would 
not  have  you  imagine  that  any  consideration  less  than  the 
Favour  of  God  could  have  prevailed  on  me  to  appear  in 
print " — and  she  believed  unmistakably  that  she  was  utter 
ing  a  divinely-given  word,  and  not  "  the  productions  of 
an  enthusiastick  brain."  I  shall  give  her  message  in  a  few 
words  to  show  what  the  best  Friends  of  this  period  held 
to  be  essential. 

"  There  is  one  truth,"  she  says,  "  on  which  all  I  have 
to  say  to  you  greatly  depends,  namely,  that  all  mankind 
have  within  them  a  measure  and  manifestation  of  the 

1  Southern  Quakers  and  Slavery,  p.  87. 

-  Memoir  of  Catherine  Philips  (1797),  pp.  63-101. 

3  Memoirs  of  Samuel  Fothergill,  p.  173.     Friends  were  even  less  successful  in 
spreading  their  truth  in  Georgia.     Samuel  Fothergill  went  into  Georgia,  and  be 
remarks  that  George  Whitefield  hurried  to  get  there  ahead  of  him  to  ' '  save  the 
flock,"  but  there  was  little  permanent  result  from  Fothergill's  visit.     A  Quaker 
settlement  was,  however,  made  in  the  Colony  in  1758  near  Augusta,  and  another 
settlement  was  made  in  what  is  now  M'Duffie  county  in  1770.     For  details  see 
Weeks's  Southern  Quakers  and  Slavery,  pp.  117-124. 

4  First  edition  printed  in  Philadelphia  by  Benjamin  Franklin  in  1748. 


CH.  i    QUAKERS  IN  SOUTHERN  COLONIES    301 

Light,  Spirit,  or  Grace  of  God,  so  that  salvation  is  a 
matter  of  personal  obedience."1  Then  comes  her  own 
testimony :  "  I  myself  have  through  the  Grace  of  God 
and  the  obedience  of  faith  witnessed  the  Peace  of  God 
myself,  and  am  greatly  concerned  for  the  inhabitants  of 
my  native  country  to  have  this  same  Peace."2  She 
declares  her  belief  that  it  is  possible  by  strict  obedience 
to  the  inward  Guest  and  Guide  of  the  soul  to  walk  in  the 
light,  and  she  wisely  says  that  the  true  test  of  guidance  is 
the  discovery  that  our  actions  promote  peace,  goodwill, 
charity,  and  benevolence  in  the  neighbourhood,  "  for  such 
actions  proceed  from  no  other  than  God."3  She  says 
"  the  first  day's  work  of  the  new  creation  in  my  soul  was 
that  happy  season  when  God  opened  my  eyes,  and 
appeared  in  the  Beauty  of  Holiness  to  my  soul."4  She 
insists  rightly  that  the  reason  the  heavenly  Jerusalem 
does  not  come  in  our  age  is  that  Christians  are  no  longer 
sensible  of  the  presence  of  God,  no  longer  have  the  Gospel- 
Power,  do  not  live  in  the  Eternal  Spirit,  and  substitute 
words  and  outward  services  for  Spirit  and  Life.5  And 
she  drives  home  to  her  "  friends  and  neighbours  " — in  fact 
she  says  that  she  has  come  back  from  England  under 
"the  constraint  of  the  Almighty"  to  tell  them — that 
"  Religion  is  a  heart-work,  the  battle  is  an  inward  one, 
nothing  counts  but  victory  over  sin,  nothing  but  the 
inward  possession  of  the  Love  of  God.  God  visits  you, 
the  Voice  of  the  Spirit  calls  you.  Obedience  will  bring 
the  Light  and  Truth  into  your  inward  parts,  and  you 
may  be  the  Redeemed  of  the  Lord." 6 

It  is  a  simple  little  book,  with  some  chaff,  but  with 
some  real  wheat  in  it,  and  it  gives  a  clear  idea  of  the  type 
of  preaching  which  was  heard  in  all  the  meetings  of  the 
South  as  the  itinerant  messengers  came  among  them. 

1  Substance  of  pp.  5-7.  a  P.  10.  *  P.  17. 

4  Condensed,  pp.  22-23.  8  ^P-  140-141.  •  P.  156  seqf 


CHAPTER    II 

THE   GROUP   LIFE    AND   WORK   OF    SOUTHERN    FRIENDS 

THE  little  groups  of  Friends  which  began  to  form  in 
Maryland  in  1656,  in  Virginia  in  1658,  and  in  North 
Carolina  in  1671,  gradually  developed  here  as  elsewhere 
into  organised  meetings  for  worship  and  for  "truth's 
affairs."  At  first  the  meeting  for  worship,  where  the 
little  local  group  gathered  in  the  living  faith  that  God 
was  a  real  presence  among  them,  was  almost  the  whole 
of  Quakerism.  Those  who  were  newly  "  convinced " 
quietly  marked  their  change  by  a  severer  simplicity  of 
outward  life,  by  the  unvarying  use  of  "  thou  "  and  "  thee," 
instead  of  "  you  "  for  a  single  person,  by  refusal  to  remove 
the  hat  as  a  mark  of  etiquette  or  honour,  by  the  absolute 
omission  of  every  kind  of  oath,  and  by  attendance  of  the 
meeting  for  worship  twice  each  week  at  the  home  of  some 
leading  Friend  in  the  Community. 

For  the  first  dozen  years  in  Maryland  and  Virginia 
the  organisation  of  the  Society  was  a  very  slender  affair.1 
No  central  meeting  was  held  in  either  Colony  prior  to 
1672,  and  the  local  meetings  for  business  were  irregularly 
held,  and  dealt  with  but  few  matters,  such  as  the  suffer 
ings  of  members  subjected  to  persecution,  the  marriage  of 
members,  the  needs  of  poor  families,  the  times  and  places 
of  holding  meetings,  and  exercised  perhaps  some  general 
oversight  over  the  "  walk  and  conversation  "  of  those  who 
constituted  the  "  meeting." 

1  For  example,  Burnyeat  found  in  1665  that  under  the  influence  of  John  Perrot 
Friends  in  Virginia  had  ' '  quite  forsaken  their  meetings,  and  did  not  meet  together 
once  in  a  year." — Burnyeat's  Journal,  p.  188. 

302 


CH.  ii  GROUP   LIFE  AND  WORK  303 

The  earliest  attempts  at  organisation  of  the  Society  in 
these  colonies  were  made  by  Josiah  Coale  and  George 
Rofe,  both  of  whom  were  men  of  the  constructive  type  ; 
but  the  work  of  systematic  organisation  was  finally  carried 
through  by  John  Burnyeat,  George  Fox,  and  William 
Edmundson.  Burnyeat  began  his  constructive  work  in 
the  two  colonies  in  1665,  but  he  carried  it  much  farther 
in  1671-72.  He  travelled  through  the  Virginia  towns 
where  there  were  Friends  in  the  autumn  of  1671,  and 
advised  them  to  hold  a  men's  meeting  for  business 
affairs.  In  the  following  spring  he  performed  the  same 
service  in  Maryland,  and  arranged  a  General  Meeting  for 
the  Colony  at  West  River  to  be  held  in  April,  which  George 
Fox,  opportunely  landing  from  Jamaica,  attended.  In 
the  summer  of  1672  William  Edmundson  found  affairs 
unsettled  and  out  of  order  in  Virginia,  and  he  appointed 
"  a  men's  meeting  for  settling  Friends  in  the  Way  of 
Truth's  Discipline,"  and,  upon  his  return  from  North 
Carolina  a  few  weeks  later,  this  appointed  men's  meeting 
was  held  for  settling  the  affairs  of  the  Society. 

Edmundson  writes : 

"  The  Lord's  Power  was  with  us  in  the  Men's  Meeting,  and 
Friends  received  Truth's  Discipline  in  the  Love  of  it,  as  formerly 
they  had  received  the  Doctrine  of  Truth.  Before  I  left  those 
Parts  Friends  desired  another  Men's  Meeting ;  so  we  appointed 
another."  l 

This  proved  to  be  a  very  large  meeting,  and  was 
occupied  with  "  the  affairs  of  the  Church  "  :  "  to  provide 
for  poor  widows  and  fatherless  children  :  to  take  care  that 
no  disorders  were  committed  in  the  Society,  and  to  see 
that  all  lived  orderly  according  to  what  they  professed." 2 

These  accounts  show  plainly  enough  that  previous  to 
this  time  the  organisation  was  of  the  loosest  character, 
business  meetings  being  held  only  at  the  call  of  some 
travelling  Friend  with  a  constructive  turn  of  mind. 
George  Fox  continued  this  organising  work,  "  wonderfully 
opening "  to  the  people  the  use  and  value  of  meetings  for 
Church  affairs  ;  and  when  he  sailed  for  England  he  could 

1  Journal,  p.  60.  a  Ibid.  p.  62. 


304  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

honestly  say  that  "  Friends  in  those  parts  are  well 
established  in  the  Truth." 

The  earliest  official  document  from  Friends  in  Mary 
land  is  an  epistle  from  the  General  Meeting  for  the 
colony  held  at  West  River,  June  6,  1674,  and  addressed 
"to  the  Men's  Meeting  of  Friends  in  Bristol,"  England. 
The  epistle  is  largely  occupied  with  homily,  but  there  are 
a  few  living  passages  in  it  which  reveal  the  condition  of 
these  people  who  have  formed  themselves  into  a  Society. 
"  We  truly  desire,"  they  say,  "  to  tread  and  walk  in  the 
blessed  truth."  "  Much  people  there  be  in  our  country," 
the  epistle  states,  "  that  comes  to  hear  truth  declared, 
which  in  its  eternal  authority  is  over  all  and  many  there 
be  that  by  it  are  convicted." * 

No  minutes  of  any  Quaker  meeting  in  Maryland  are 
extant  for  a  date  earlier  than  1677,  the  first  surviving 
minute  being  that  of  a  Men's  Meeting  held  at  the  house 
of  Wenlock  Christison  on  the  Eastern  Shore  of  the 
Chesapeake,  March  24,  1677.  Christison  is  the  old 
hero  who  had  braved  the  dangers  of  missionary  activity  in 
Massachusetts  and  had  been  condemned  to  die  on  the 
Boston  gallows,  but  was  finally  released  and  given  his 
life.  He  settled,  not  long  after  his  "  escape,"  at  Tredhaven 
in  Talbot  County,  and  became  one  of  the  leading  person 
alities  and  one  of  the  foremost  influences  in  the  Maryland 
Society  ;  but  his  heroism  and  his  distinction  as  an  apostle 
who  had  suffered  much  did  not  raise  him  above  the 
judgment  of  his  fellow-members.  He  had  been  valiant  for 
the  truth  in  Boston,  and  had  steered  his  course  straight 
on  through  all  the  wiles  of  the  enemy,  but  evidently  he 
had  succumbed  to  the  attraction  of  some  woman  "  not  of 
the  Society."  The  Men's  Meeting  in  July  held  at  his  own 
house  "  took  him  under  dealing  "  : 

"  Att  our  Mans  Meeting  at  Wenlock  Christison's  house  ye  i4th 
of  5th  mo.  [July]  1677,  Wenlock  Christison  declared  in  ye 
meeting  that  if  ye  world  or  any  particular  person  should  speak 
evilly  of  ye  Truth  or  reproach  Friends  concerning  his  proceedings 

1  The  original  copy  is  on  the  Bristol  Minutes.     It  is  printed  in  Bowdeii,  i. 
379- 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  305 

in  taking  his  wife,  that  then  he  would  give  further  satisfaction 
and  clear  ye  Truth  and  Friends  by  giving  forth  a  paper  to 
condemn  his  hasty  and  forward  proceedings  in  ye  matter,  and 
he  said  that  were  ye  thing  to  do  again  he  would  not  proceed  so 
hasty,  nor  without  consent  of  Friends." 

For  many  years  the  General  Meeting  for  the  Colony, 
consisting  both  of  "  a  Men's  Meeting  "  and  "  a  Women's 
Meeting,"  were  held  alternately  at  half-year  periods  on 
the  Western  Shore  and  the  Eastern  Shore.  Monthly 
Meetings  were  also  held  dating  probably  from  the  time 
of  Fox's  visit,  at  the  localities  where  there  were  large 
numbers  of  Friends.  The  Minutes  of  the  Men's  Meeting 
for  1679  held  on  the  Western  Shore  received  reports 
from  several  local  meetings  of  the  Monthly  type,  as 
follows :  Severn,  South  River,  West  River,  "  The  Cliffs," 
Herring  Creek,  Patuxent,  Muddy  Creek,  Accomack, 
Anamessicks,  Munny,  Choptank,  Tuckahoe,  Betties 
Cove,  Bay  Side,  and  Chester  River.  Quarterly  Meet 
ings  began  in  Maryland,  as  far  as  the  records  indicate, 
in  1679.  One  was  organised  that  year  for  the  Western 
Shore  "to  be  kept  at  Aun  Chew's  house  at  Herring 
Creek  for  the  easing  of  the  Monthly  Meeting  and  Half 
Years  Meeting,  so  that  they  may  not  be  so  much  con 
cerned  with  outward  matters." l  Another  Quarterly 
Meeting  was  established  on  the  Eastern  Shore,  probably 
the  same  year,  as  the  first  official  reference  to  it  occurs 
under  date  of  1/j.th  November  1679. 

The  earliest  minutes  contain  interesting  information  of 
the  way  the  meeting  funds  were  raised  and  expended. 
All  the  funds  of  these  meetings  in  the  primitive  days 
were  in  terms  of  tobacco.  In  1677  the  Friends  of  the 
Eastern  Shore  "  thought  it  fitt  and  meet "  to  gather  a 
"  stock "  or  general  fund,  "  for  the  service  of  Truth," 
"every  Friend  being  left  to  his  freedom  what  to  give," 
and  for  the  care  of  the  poor,  for  which  purpose  the 
members  contributed  8650  pounds  of  tobacco.  A  similar 
fund  was  raised  for  the  Western  Shore  and  "kept  at 
John  Gary's  for  the  service  of  Truth."  Eighteen  hundred 

1  Minutes  of  Men's  Meetings,  4th  July  1679. 

X 


306  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

pounds  of  tobacco  out  of  this  latter  fund  were  used  to 
purchase  "  a  shallop  for  Friends'  service,"  as  a  boat 
furnished  the  readiest  method  of  travel  to  and  from 
meetings  along  the  shores  of  the  Chesapeake.  All  the 
meetings  of  every  type  were  held  in  the  homes  of  members 
during  the  first  twenty  years  of  the  history  of  the  Society. 
The  first  meeting-house  built  in  the  Colony  was  at  Betties 
Cove  on  the  Eastern  Shore,  and  by  the  minutes  of  a 
Men's  Meeting  held  at  Wenlock  Christison's  in  1678  it 
appears  that  this  house  was  at  that  time  still  unfinished, 
for  it  was  then  decided  to  "  loft  it,"  and  to  "  partition  it 
with  falling  windows  hung  on  hinges,"  but  for  a  long  time 
even  after  this  Friends  continued  to  hold  "house- 
meetings  "  in  most  localities  of  Maryland. 

In  Virginia  there  were  no  regular,  settled  meetings 
"  for  the  affairs  of  Truth "  before  the  visits  of  Fox  and 
Edmundson.  The  General  Meeting  for  the  entire  Colony 
was  begun  at  the  suggestion  of  George  Fox  in  1673. 
Fox's  letter  to  the  scattered  Friends  of  the  Colony  is  a 
brief  and  lucid  expression  of  the  true  idea  of  a  Quaker 
meeting  : 

"  Meet  to  geather  in  the  power  and  wisdom  of  God  and  keep 
a  mans  meeting  and  see  that  all  who  proffeseth  the  Lord  and 
Glorious  Gospel  of  Christ  Jesus  may  walk  in  it  and  stand  by 
Righteousness  and  holiness  as  becomes  the  house  of  God,  and  stand 
for  Gods  glory  and  his  name,  so  that  all  that  doe  proffes  his  Name 
may  nott  dishonor  it  nor  cause  his  name  to  be  blasphemed,  nor  his 
gracious  truth  to  be  evill  spoken  off,  and  see  that  nothing  be  lacking 
amongst  ffriends  meetings;  and  see  that  you  all  be  as  one  famyly 
together  in  the  house  of  God." l 

The  earliest  monthly  meetings  in  the  Colony  go  back 
to  about  the  same  date  as  the  central  General  Meeting — 
1673,  though  no  official  accounts  appear  from  this 
primitive  stage.  Chuckatuck  Monthly  Meeting  was 
certainly  in  existence  in  1683,  and  Curies  (later  called 
Henrico)  was  established  in  1698.  White  Oak  Swamp 
Monthly  Meeting  was  established  in  1 700  and  Nansemond, 

1  Minutes  of  Lower  Virginia  Meeting. 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  307 

Pagan  Creek,  Surry,  Wain  Oak,  and  Warwick  have 
records  dating  from  I7O2.1 

The  first  Quarterly  Meeting  in  the  Colony  was  Lower 
Virginia  Quarterly  Meeting  which  was  established  at 
least  as  early  as  1696.  It  was  known,  as  most  of  these 
Virginia  Meetings  were  known,  under  many  variant 
names.  Upper  Virginia  Quarterly  Meeting  dates  from 
1700,  and  in  1706  the  Lower  Quarterly  Meeting  was 
divided,  forming  a  new  one  occupying  the  middle  section 
of  the  Quaker  region  under  the  name  of  Chuckatuck. 

North  Carolina  Yearly  Meeting  was  organised  in 
1698,  as  appears  from  a  minute  of  the  Quarterly  Meeting 
held  at  the  house  of  Henry  White  the  4th  of  June  1698  : 

"  It  was  unanimous  agreed  by  friends  .  .  .  that  on  the  last 
seventh-day  of  the  7th  month  in  Every  yere  to  be  the  yerely 
meeting  for  this  Cuntree  at  the  house  of  ffrancis  tooms  [Toms] 
the  Elder,  and  the  second  day  of  the  weke  following  to  be  seat 
apart  for  business." 

The  Quarterly  Meeting  at  which  this  action  was  taken 
was  Eastern  Quarterly  Meeting  which  was  established 
probably  in  1681  for  Friends  in  Pasquotank,  Perquimans, 
and  Northampton  Counties.  The  earliest  monthly  meeting 
record  for  this  Colony  is  that  of  one  held  at  the  house  of 
Francis  Toms  in  1 680,  though  according  to  the  usual 
custom  of  Friends  there  were  probably  meetings  "  for  the 
affairs  of  Truth"  much  earlier  than  this.  By  the  year 

1  I  give  as  complete  a  list  of  Virginia  Monthly  Meetings  as  I  have  been  able 
to  make  out : 

Black  Water Established  1757 

Caroline  (sometimes  called  Cedar  Creek)     .  ,,          1739 

Chuckatuck       .         .         .     Known  to  be  in  existence  as  early  as  1683 
Curies  (later  called  Henrico)       ....          Established  1698 

Denby      ........  ,,  1716 

Fairfax     .  ,,          1744 

Hopewell . 
Isle  of  Wight 


Nansemond 
Pagan  Creek 
South  River 
Surry 
Wainoak . 
Warwick  . 


Records  under  this  name  begin  1767 
,,      1702 

i,  ,.  ,,      1702 

Established  1757 
„  1702 
,,  1702 
1702 


White  Oak   Swamp  (probably  a  variant   name  for   some  other 
Monthly  Meeting) Dates  from  about  1700 


308   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 


1700  there  seem  to  have  been  three  monthly  meetings 
in  this  Colony :  one  at  the  house  of  Francis  Toms  in 
Ferquimans  County  ;  one  at  the  house  of  Jonathan  Phelps, 
also  in  Perquimans ;  and  one  in  Pasquotank. l 

The  most  impressive  feature  of  these  various  meetings, 
stretching  in  a  long  chain  of  Quaker  settlements  from 
the  Chesapeake  on  the  North  to  Charleston  on  the  South, 
was  their  watchful  care  over  the  outer  and  inner  life  of 
the  membership — what  the  Friends  of  that  time  called 
"  the  walk  and  conversation."  The  paternalism  of  this 
early  Quakerism  would  with  difficulty  be  endured  to-day, 
but  it  fitted  the  needs  of  that  period  well ;  and  it  produced 
results  in  social  morality  and  in  individual  character 
which  could  hardly  have  been  surpassed  under  any  freer 
methods.  The  quiet  ministry  to  the  necessities  of  the 
poor  members,  as  it  was  managed  by  the  Quaker  Meeting, 
cannot  be  too  highly  praised.  Every  effort  was  made  to 
assist  the  needy  to  help  themselves  and,  where  this  was 
manifestly  impossible,  the  administration  of  charity  was 
handled  in  a  most  private  and  unobtrusive  way.  "  Great 
care  and  serious  weighing"  was  bestowed  upon  the 
estates,  condition,  and  education  of  orphans  committed  to 
the  oversight  of  Friends.  By  a  minute  of  Maryland 
Yearly  Meeting  for  1678,  provision  was  made  that  one 
person  in  every  local  meeting  should  be  chosen  to  see 
that  no  orphan  is  abused,  nor  his  estate  wasted,  and  that 
proper  opportunities  for  his  education  are  supplied.  The 
Women  Friends,  always  alive  to  formative  influences, 

1  I  give  the  following  list  of  the  other  Colonial  Monthly  Meetings  in  the 
Carolinas,  compiled  from  the  appendix  of  Weeks'  Southern  Quakers  and  Slavery  : 
Bush  River    .         .  .  Founded  1770 

Cane  Creek,  N.C. 
Cane  Creek,  S.C. 
Carver's  Creelc 
Centre 
Contentnea  . 
Core  Sound . 
Deep  River  . 
Dunn's  Creek 
Falling  Creek 

Fredericksburg  (later  called  Water  e) 
New  Garden 
Rich  Square 
Wells 


175* 
1773 
1746 
1772 
1743 
*733 
1778 
1746 
1748 
175° 
1754 
1760 
1764 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  309 

took  up  the  subject  of  education  at  their  Half  Year's 
Meeting  in  Maryland  in  1679,  and  adopted  this  quaint 
minute  which  probably  bore  some  fruit : 

"  We  takeing  it  into  serious  Consideration  Consuming  our 
Childrens  going  to  Scolle  hath  thought  meett  in  ye  wisdoum  of 
god  to  giue  ocation  to  all  ffriends  that  those  that  are  scoole 
masters  may  be  Exhorted  to  teach  their  Children  in  ye  practice 
boath  in  words,  ways  and  actions  wh  beComes  ye  Blessed  truth, 
and  that  we  cannott,  neither  will,  allow  them  to  practice  any  of 
ye  worlds  liberty  in  any  manner  of  practice  wch  ye  truth  alowes 
not,  and  alsoe  its  desired  that  ffriends  be  diligent  to  provide 
ffriends  and  scripture  Boocks,  and  if  possible  to  have  a  ffriend 
to  be  scool  Master  or  Mistress. 

"  This  being  presented  to  our  brethren  of  ye  Mens  Meeting  at 
ye  time  aforesaid  they  had  Unity  with  it."1 

A  similar  "  serious  Consideration  Consuming  Childrens 
going  to  Scolle  "  appeared  in  all  the  other  Quaker  sections, 
and  led  to  the  establishment  of  a  great  many  small 
schools  for  the  "  guarded  "  education — within  rather  severe 
limits — of  the  children  of  the  membership. 

The  meetings  followed  up  their  distant  members,  and 
exercised  a  paternal  care  over  those  who  moved  into 
towns  where  there  was  no  meeting  for  them  to  attend. 
If  a  member  was  going  on  a  journey  far  from  home, 
he  was  supplied  with  an  indorsed  document  from  his 
meeting,  which  introduced  him  to  Friends  in  the  places  to 
which  he  was  going,  and  prepared  the  way  for  him  as  he 
travelled.  A  few  concrete  minutes  will  illustrate  the 
manner  in  which  these  matters  were  handled.  The  first 
one  is  the  case  of  a  Friend  who  had  moved  from  Mary 
land  to  Virginia,  and  had  consulted  his  meeting  for  advice 
whether  he  should  stay  or  return.  The  Minute  reads  : 

"William  Kuton  very  honestly  applies  to  this  Meeting  for 
advice  in  order  to  his  staying  or  removing  from  Rapahanock 
[Va.]  Inasmuch  as  there  is  no  ffriends  meeting  there  but 
himself,  he  signifyeth  that  he  finds  something  stirring  in  his 
heart  with  love  of  god  to  the  people,  and  by  himself  hath  not 
freedom  to  remove.  He  desires  that  if  the  Meeting  do  judge 

1  Minutes  of  Women's  Half  Year's  Meeting  for  1679. 


310  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  m 

it  meet  he  should  stay,  they  would  take  care  that  he  may  be 
visited  on  all  opportunities  that  present,  and  that  ffriends 
would  acquaint  travelling  ffriends  of  that  same,  that  so  if 
possible  the  desire  of  his  heart  may  be  answered  concerning 
that  people.  The  Meeting  approveth  of  what  ye  ffriend  hath 
proposed,  and  doe  advise  that  his  request  may  be  answered  by 
ffriends  on  both  shores  as  opportunity  offereth." 

The  following  minute — from  the  year  1686 — is  a  good 
illustration  of  the  care  taken  for  journeying  members  : 

"  Humphry  Emerton  laid  before  this  Meeting  his  intention  of 
a  voyage  for  England  about  his  outward  concerns.  This  Meeting 
desires  first  to  know  the  willingness  of  his  wife,  and  in  order 
thereto  hath  appointed  Richard  Harrison  to  discourse  with  her," 

and  forthwith  a  document  suitable  to  introduce  him  was 
prepared. 

When  a  Friend  went  out  on  a  religious  visit  "  a 
minute  of  unity"  like  the  following  was  given  to  open 
the  way  for  his  message  and  service : 

"Our  well  beloved  Friend  and  sister  Anne  Galloway  laid 
before  this  Meeting,  that  she  finding  some  drawings  in  the  love 
of  God  to  visit  Friends  in  some  parts  of  Pennsylvania,  desired 
some  lines  by  way  of  certificate  of  their  unity  with  her.  And 
whereas  our  beloved  Friend  Samuel  Galloway  hath  informed 
this  Meeting  that  he  hath  an  intention  of  accompanying  his 
wife  in  her  intended  journey  (if  extraordinary  occasion  prevents 
not)  desires  that  he  may  have  a  few  lines  by  way  of  certificate  of 
Friends  unity  with  him." 

Even  as  early  as  1705,  Friends  in  Maryland  began 
to  be  disturbed  by  the  excessive  use  of  tobacco  and 
spirituous  liquors,  and  there  are  frequent  minutes  about 
this  "  concern  of  Truth."  The  earliest  minute  which  I 
have  found  on  the  subject,  under  date  of  1705,  will 
indicate  the  way  they  dealt  with  the  difficulty : 

"This  Meeting  having  a  weighty  sense  upon  their  minds 
concerning  the  immoderate  use  of  Tobacco,  does  advise  that  all 
may  forbear  the  abuse  of  the  same,  and  that  those  friends  that 
are  appointed  to  give  accompt  of  the  state  of  the  Meeting  they 
belong  to  may  forbear  the  excess  of  smoking  themselves,  and 
also  caution  and  advise  all  friends  against  the  immoderate  use  of 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  311 

the  same,  and  that  they  give  accompt  to  the  Monthly  Meeting 
what  progress  they  have  made  therein."  l 

The  Friends  in  Maryland  were  troubled  for  many  years 
by  the  sale  of  liquors  in  the  near  neighbourhood  of  the 
meeting-house  at  the  time  of  their  Yearly  Meeting.  The 
occasion  was  seized  upon  by  "  the  world's  people "  as  a 
good  time  to  "transact  trades,"  and,  to  the  scandal  of 
Friends,  the  meeting-place  was  made  "  a  kind  of  market  or 
change  where  the  captains  of  ships  and  the  planters  met 
and  settled  their  affairs."  The  Friends  were  pleased  to 
have  "  the  abundance  of  people  from  the  country  round 
about "  flock  in,  but  they  were  also  determined  to  "  prevent 
ye  buying  of  drink  at  the  time  of  Yearly  Meeting,"  and 
thereupon  they  addressed  the  government  of  Maryland 
"for  ye  prevention  and  suppressing  of  the  evil  practice 
with  the  evil  consequences  attending  it."2  Their  appeal 
was  in  due  time  effective,  for  an  Act  was  passed  in  1725, 
preventing  the  sale  of  liquors  in  booths  within  one  mile 
of  the  Quaker  meeting-house  in  Talbot  County,  or  within 
two  miles  of  the  meeting-house  near  West  River  in  Ann 
Arundel  County.3 

Virginia  Friends  took  the  position,  as  Friends  else 
where  did  in  the  early  stage  of  moral  awakening  on  these 
matters,  that  liquor-drinking  must  be  done,  if  at  all,  in 
moderation.  The  Yearly  Meeting  of  1704  expressed  in  a 
minute  the  advice  that  members  of  the  Society  "  do 
keep  out  of  unnecessary  providing  of  strong  drink,  and 
do  keep  in  Christian  moderation  at  times  of  births, 
burials,  or  marriages." 4  One  of  the  most  amusing  minutes 

1  Minutes  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  for  1705. 

2  Minutes  of  Yearly  Meeting  for  1711. 

3  Bacon's  Laws  1725,  chapter  6. 

4  It  was  not  until  1782  that  Virginia  Yearly  Meeting  took  action  prohibiting 
the  distillation  of  liquor  by  their  members  : 

' '  The  Meeting  being  deeply  concerned  at  this  time  to  endeavour  to  remove 
from  amongst  us  such  things  as  appear  to  be  an  evil  tendency,  and  as  the 
distilling  spirits  from  grain  is  believed  to  be  wrong,  Friends  are  therefore  hereby 
prohibited  using  grain  of  any  sort  in  that  manner  ;  and  if  any  should  continue  so 
to  do,  such  ought  to  be  treated  with  as  disregarding  the  unity  of  the  body.  And 
as  trading  in  spirituous  liquors,  and  frequent,  and  unnecessary  use  thereof  hath 
also  appeared  to  have  many  bad  effects ;  Friends  are  therefore  advised  against 
these  practices. " 


312   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

on  the  subject  of  moderation  came  from  North  Carolina, 
where  Friends  were  urged  to  "  use  tobacco  with  great 
moderation  as  a  medison  and  not  as  a  delightsome 
companion  ! " l 

There  was,  however,  a  strange  mingling  of  the  large 
and  the  little,  the  important  and  the  petty,  in  the  paternal 
care  which  these  meetings  exercised.  The  moral  and  the 
merely  ceremonial  ran  blurringly  together.  Dress,  speech, 
and  marriage  with  a  companion  "  of  the  world"  early 
came  to  be  questions  of  first  importance.  In  1700  the 
Women's  General  Meeting  for  Maryland  decided  "  under 
waity  consideration,  in  the  wisdom  of  God  "  to  hold  three 
times  a  year  "  a  private  meeting  of  the  solidest  women 
Friends  to  wait  upon  the  Lord  and  to  inspect  into  the 
most  waitiest  affairs  of  Truth  " — these  "  waitiest  affairs  of 
Truth  "  being  mainly  matters  of  dress  and  marriage.  A 
minute  of  this  "  private  meeting,"  dated  1708,  declares  : 

"  It  Lies  very  Waityly  uppon  us  to  Desir  all  friends  Profesing 
truth  to  be  very  Carefull  to  keep  out  of  all  Imytations  of 
Fashghons  which  the  world  Runs  into :  Butt  to  keep  to  Plain 
ness  of  Speach  and  Plainness  in  Dress  in  our  Selves,  and  our 
Children ;  Labouring  in  our  Selves  and  with  them  to  be  clothed 
with  ye  meak  spirit  of  Jesus  as  such  as  are  waighting  for  his 
coming." 

Similar  minutes  come  from  every  section  of  Quakerdom 
throughout  the  entire  colonial  period  from  the  time  when 
meetings  for  business  affairs  were  organised.  The  follow 
ing  specimen  minute  from  the  North  Carolina  Records  has 
a  peculiarly  nai've  flavour  : 

"Friends  are  advised  against  wearing  coats  and  other 
garments  made  after  the  new  and  superfluous  fashions  of  the 
times,  and  no  Friend  is  to  wear  a  wig,  but  such  as  apply  to  the 
monthly  meeting  giving  their  reasons  for  so  doing." 

But  the  subject  of  overwhelming  importance  was  that 
of  marriage,  for  it  had  early  become  a  fixed  idea  with 
Friends  that  there  should  be  no  mixed  marriages,  i.e. 
marriages  with  persons  "  not  of  the  Society."  We  have 

1  Quoted  from  Weeks's  Southern  Quakerism,  p.  128. 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  313 

already  seen  how  the  Meeting  on  the  Eastern  Shore  of 
the  Chesapeake  compelled  its  foremost  member,  Wenlock 
Christison,  to  apologise  for  his  "  hasty  marriage,"  and  it 
allowed  no  one  to  deviate  "  from  good  order "  in  this 
matter.  As  an  illustration  of  the  care  taken  even  when 
both  bride  and  groom  were  Friends,  the  following  minute 
is  of  interest : 

"  Att  a  Halfe  Years  Womens  Meeting  at  the  house  of  John 
Pitt  ye  3rd  of  ye  5  mt.  1678. 

"  Obadiah  Judkins  Lay'd  a  matter  of  maradge  before  us  with 
Obedience  Jenner  and  wee  taking  itt  into  Consideration,  she 
Coming  lately  from  England,  thought  it  Requisite  that  they 
should  stay  till  a  Certificate  can  be  secured,  and  in  ye  meantime 
they  should  dwell  asunder." 

There  are  many  such  entries  as  this  of  the  year  1687: 

"We  are  informed  of  a  yong  ffriendly  woman  dwelling  at 
Choptank  [Maryland]  that  is  married  to  one  of  ye  world  and 
after  ye  manner  of  ye  world ;  ye  care  and  consurn  of  which  is 
referred  to  ye  womens  meeting  on  ye  Eastern  Shore." 

The  women  Friends  of  Maryland  made  a  most  drastic 
proposal  in  1691  to  force  the  children  of  the  meeting  to 
live  up  "  to  the  testimony  of  Truth." 

"  Itts  the  Sence  of  this  Meeting  that  when  Parents  that  have 
Children  that  Marries  against  and  Contrary  to  their  Parents 
mind,  and  shall  give  them  any  part  of  their  outward  Estates  it  is 
encouragement  for  others  to  take  the  like  disobedient  Course  and 
it  is  of  bad  Consequence,  and  this  Meeting  Advice  is  that  all 
Friends  that  may  be  Concerned  in  like  Case  doe  Refrain  from 
giving  such  Rebellious  Children  any  part  of  their  outward  Estates 
that  soe  such  like  Spiritts  in  Friends  children  may  be  discouraged 
and  not  encouraged."  * 

By  means  of  an  extensive  epistolary  correspondence, 
beginning  from  the  earliest  organisation  of  the  Society  in 
America,  the  Friends,  withdrawn  from  the  rest  of  the 
"  world,"  kept  in  constant  rapport  with  each  other.  So 
long  as  George  Fox  lived,  he  wrote  frequently  to  the 

1  This  attitude  toward  "rebellious  children"  was  adopted  by  the  Men's 
Meeting  both  in  Maryland  and  in  Virginia. 


314  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

meetings   in  the   colonies,   and   after  his   death   his  wife 
continued  the  correspondence. 

A  minute  of  the  Yearly  Womens'  Meeting  at  West 
River  in  1 699  reports  : 

"An  Apistle  from  our  Dear  friend  Margaret  fox  from  the 
Quarterly  Meetting  att  Lancaster,  In  Old  England  was  read  in 
our  Meeting  and  ffriends  haueing  True  Unity  with  ye  same  and 
Desireing  wee  may  Eye  the  great  Love  of  Oure  God  in  this  and 
all  things  agreeable  to  his  blessed  truth  to  ye  end  of  our  Dayes, 
Doth  appoint  Eliz.  Talbott,  and  Ann  Galloway  to  Write  and 
answer  to  the  aboue  Said  Apistle  and  to  send  itt  by  the  first 
opportunity  In  behalf  of  Said  Meetting." 

The  Yearly  Meetings,  both  for  men  and  for  women,, 
all  over  the  world  sent  Epistles  to  each  other,  and  it  was 
quite  usual  for  the  lower  or  subordinate  meetings  to  send 
similar  Epistles  if  special  occasions  called  for  such  action, 
or  "  if  something  rose  freshly  in  the  minds  of  any  as  a 
living  message."  One  of  the  most  amusing  incidents  in 
this  widespread  intercourse  of  love  and  fellowship  was 
the  sending  of  two  hogsheads  of  tobacco  from  the  women 
Friends  of  Maryland  to  the  women  of  London  in  1678. 
The  minute  of  this  "  concern  "  says  : 

"  We  hauing  Reseaved  many  Episels  from  our  dear  friends  in 
London  and  of  late  a  Prcell  of  Boocks  as  a  token  of  true  love  to 
our  women's  Meetting  here  in  Maryland,  it  is  agreed  upon  at 
this  our  generall  Meetting  to  wright  a  Lettr.  from  ye  womens 
Meetting  hear  in  Maryland  to  ye  Womens  Meetting  in  London 
and  to  send  it  with  two  hhd.  of  tobacco,  and  it  is  agreed  upon 
that  Eliz.  Larance  and  Alice  Gary  doe  take  Care  to  prouide  one 
hhd.  for  ye  Western  Shore,  and  Madgdelin  Stevens  and  Sarah 
Thomas  to  privd  one  hhd.  for  ye  Eastern  Shore,  and  if  possible 
they  be  sent  together,  and  Margarett  Berry  is  desired  to  wright 
ye  Letter  to  ye  womens  Meetting  in  London." 

By  the  opening  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  Friends 
were  one  people  throughout  the  world,  though  there  was 
absolutely  no  bond  but  love  and  fellowship.  There  was 
no  visible  head  to  the  Society,  no  official  creed,  no- 
ecclesiastical  body  which  held  sway  and  authority.  But 
instead  of  being  an  aggregation  of  separate  units  the 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  315 

Society  was  in  an  extraordinary  measure  a  living  group. 
Friends  had  suffered  together  and  they  were  baptized 
into  one  spirit.  Wherever  any  Friend  was  in  trouble  the 
world  over,  all  Friends,  however  remote,  were  concerned, 
and  were  ready  to  help  share  the  trouble  if  it  could  be 
shared.  The  way  in  which  Friends  bore  each  other's 
burdens  is  well  illustrated  by  a  passage  in  an  epistle  to 
George  Fox  from  the  Half  Year's  Meeting  in  Maryland 
in  1683  : 

"  There  are  many  Friends  in  this  province  who  find  a  concern 
laid  upon  them  to  visit  the  seed  of  God  in  Carolina,  for  we 
understand  that  the  spoiler  makes  havoc  of  the  flock  there :  so 
here  are  many  weighty  Friends  intending  to  go  down  there  on 
that  service."1 

Every  meeting  took  care  of  its  own  poor,  and  had  a 
permanent  poor-fund  always  ready.  There  is  no  unifier 
like  love,  and  nothing  creates  the  group-spirit  as  does  the 
fellowship-interest.  Nowhere  except  in  the  primitive 
Church  has  there  been  a  more  amazing  interchange  of 
fellowship,  a  more  spontaneous  itinerancy,  than  among  the 
Friends.  Harnack  says  : 

"  At  a  time  when  Christianity  was  still  a  homeless  religion, 
the  occasional  travels  of  brethren  were  frequently  the  means  of 
bringing  churches  together,  which  otherwise  would  have  had  no 
common  tie."  2 

A  living  interest  in  the  collective  Church  of  Christ,  he 
points  out,  throbbed  with  intensity  through  each  particular 
Church,  and  the  men  of  spiritual  vision  and  leadership 
contributed  themselves  to  the  whole  Church.  So  it  was, 
too,  in  the  formative  period  of  Quakerism.  The  greatest 
and  the  best  of  the  entire  Society  made  their  way  from 
meeting  to  meeting,  and  from  house  to  house — even  into 
the  cabin  of  the  settler  on  the  frontier — and  they  wove 
an  invisible  bond,  stronger  than  the  infallible  decrees  of 
Councils,  which  held  the  whole  body  together  as  an 
integral  unit.  Hospitality  with  the  Quaker  was  not  a 
virtue,  it  was  an  unconscious  habit.  His  house  was  wide 

1  Quoted  from  Bowden,  i.  385. 

2  The  Mission  and  Expansion  of  Christianity,  i.  179. 


316  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES  BK.  m 

open  to  every  Friend  who  passed  that  way,  and,  especially 
on  great  meeting-days,  there  were  practically  no  limits  to 
the  hospitality  of  board  or  bed. 

"  Differences,"  disputes,  and  controversies  between 
Friends  were  not  taken  into  court,  but  were  settled  in 
meeting  by  the  family  method.  However  complex  and 
complicated  the  affairs  at  issue  might  be,  the  meeting 
grappled  with  them,  and  brought  order  out  of  chaos. 
For  example,  two  Friends  in  Virginia  in  1749  had  a 
financial  difference,  which  the  Monthly  Meeting  considered 
would,  if  continued,  have  "  pernishous  consequences  to  the 
trooth  and  its  prosperity."  The  meeting  took  up  the  case, 
and  induced  the  contenders  to  refer  their  controversy  to 
the  judgment  of  three  Friends.  It  was  thus  settled 
satisfactorily,  "  brotherhood  between  them  was  preserved, 
and  scandal  was  prevented." l  There  are  hundreds  of 
similar  arbitrations  on  the  various  minute  books,  and 
generally,  if  not  always,  the  meetings  proved  able  to 
settle  the  affair  in  dispute,  and  preserve  brotherhood. 

The  simplicity  and  artlessness  of  these  colonial 
Friends  appear  in  almost  all  their  methods  as  a  few 
samples  will  show.  In  1702  Virginia  Friends  had  "a 
deep  and  weighty  sense"  that  the  affairs  of  the  Church 
could  be  improved,  "  if  but  one  person  should  speak  at  a 
time,"  and  the  Yearly  Meeting  gave  "  wholesum  counsil  " 
to  meetings  everywhere  to  practise  this  plan  of  procedure, 
"  which  will  be,"  the  minute  of  advice  says,  "  a  sweet 
savour,  we  doubt  not ! "  2 

In  1724  Thomas  Pleasants  asked  to  be  released  from 
the  duties  of  clerk  to  his  monthly  meeting,  "since  it  hath 
pleased  the  Lord  to  give  him  a  few  words  to  speak  in  the 
assemblies  of  God's  people."  A  touchingly  simple  effort 
to  advance  "  the  truth  "  appears  in  a  letter  from  two  rural 
Friends  in  Henrico  county,  Virginia,  in  1701. 

"  Friends,  wee  thought  to  acquaint  you  that  we  are  willing  to 
have  a  First<lay  Meeting  at  our  house,  hoping  it  would  be  for 
the  glory  of  the  Lord,  and  the  prosperity  of  his  blessed  Truth." 

1  Minutes  of  White  Oak  Swamp  Monthly  Meeting,  1749. 

2  Minutes  of  Virginia  Yearly  Meeting  for  1702. 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  317 

One  of  the  earliest  corporate  activities  of  Friends  in 
the  Southern  colonies  was  directed  toward  the  achievement 
of  religious  freedom,  because  their  very  chance  of  survival 
as  a  religious  people  hung  upon  the  attainment  of  such 
freedom.  The  system  of  Church  uniformity  weighed  most 
severely  in  Virginia.  Nowhere  except  in  Massachusetts 
was  the  pressure  so  heavy,  and,  in  the  form  of  distraints 
for  tithes,  it  was  continued  long  after  the  New  England 
Quakers  were  living  in  peace.  The  kind  of  persecution 
to  which  all  Friends  in  Virginia  were  subjected  in  the 
eighteenth  century  may  be  seen  in  the  laconic  report  of 
Thomas  Jordan  to  his  Monthly  Meeting  in  1700  on  his 
sufferings : 

"Six  weeks  Imprisonment  for  being  Taken  Att  A  Meeting  in  my 
own  house  and  Released  by  the  Kings  Proclamation ;  again  taken 
at  a  meeting  at  Robert  Lawrence,  and  bound  ouer  to  the  Court 
of  Nansemond,  and,  for  refusing  to  swear  according  to  their  will 
and  against  the  Command  of  Christ,  was  sent  up  to  Jamestown 
a  Prisoner  upwards  of  ten  months.  Presently  After  John  Blake 
tooke  away  my  3  servants  And  left  my  wife  in  a  Distressed 
Condition  with  A  young  Child  sucking  at  her  Breasts  that  to 
help  her  selfe  the  Child  did  hurt  Itt  selfe  with  Crying,  wch. 
servants  were  kept  about  nine  weeks  and  then  returned  again 
by  the  Governors  order.  Taken  by  Distress  by  Jno.  Blake,  bed 
Sheriff  of  Nansemond  County :  Two  feather  bedes  and  three 
feather  Boalsters  and  furniture  to  them  with  other  goodes  wch. 
did  amount  to  3967  Pounds  of  Tobbacco,  also  a  servant  man 
that  had  3  years  to  serve.  Taken  by  distress  by  Thomas  Godwin 
Sherieff :  Ten  head  of  Cattells  and  delivered  to  Wm.  Stinton  of 
James  Towne." 

Robert  Jordan  has  left  his  own  account  of  his  sufferings, 
which  will  touch  the  reader  with  sympathy  for  this  defender 
of  the  American  idea  that  religion  and  religious  contribu 
tions  are  matters  for  the  individual  conscience  to  settle : 

"  Being  committed  to  prison,  I  was  first  placed  in  the  debtor's 
apartment,  but  in  a  few  days  was  removed  into  the  common  side, 
where  condemned  persons  are  kept,  and  for  some  time  had  not 
the  privilege  of  seeing  anybody,  except  a  negro  who  once  a  day 
brought  water  to  the  prisoners ;  this  place  was  so  dark  that  I 
could  not  see  to  read  even  at  noon,  without  creeping  to  small 
holes  in  the  door ;  being  also  very  noisome,  the  infectious  air 


318   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

brought  on  me  the  flux,  so  that,  had  not  the  Lord  been  pleased 
to  sustain  me  by  his  invisible  hand,  I  had  there  lost  my  life ;  the 
governor  was  made  acquainted  with  my  condition,  and  I  believe 
used  his  endeavors  for  my  liberty ;  the  commissary  visited  me 
more  than  once  under  a  show  of  friendship,  but  with  a  view  to 
ensnare  me,  and  I  was  very  weary  of  him.  I  wrote  again  to  the 
governor,  to  acquaint  him  with  my  situation,  and  so,  after  a 
confinement  of  three  weeks,  I  was  discharged,  without  any 
acknowledgment  of  compliance,  and  this  brought  me  into  an 
acquaintance  and  ready  admittance  to  the  Governor,  who  said 
I  was  a  meek  man." l 

"  Destraints  for  priest's  wages,"  as  Friends  called  these 
forced  contributions,  lasted  in  Virginia  until  the  adoption 
of  the  Bill  of  Rights  at  the  opening  of  the  Revolutionary 
War. 

The  sixteenth  section  of  this  famous  Bill,  which  was 
drafted  by  Patrick  Henry,  embodied  this  noble  principle 
for  which  the  Quakers  had  wrought  and  fought  for  a 
hundred  years,  and  for  which  they  suffered  imprisonment 
and  annual  loss  of  goods  : 

"  Religion,  or  the  duty  which  we  owe  to  our  Creator,  and  the 
manner  of  discharging  it,  can  be  directed  only  by  reason  and 
conviction,  not  by  force  and  violence,  and  therefore  all  men  are 
equally  entitled  to  the  free  exercise  of  religion,  according  to  the 
dictates  of  conscience ;  and  it  is  the  mutual  duty  of  all  to  practice 
Christian  forbearance,  love,  and  charity  toward  each  other."  2 

This  principle  was  put  into  practical  effect  in  October 
of  the  same  year  by  the  definite  enactment  that  all  laws 
prescribing  punishment  "  for  maintaining  any  opinions  in 
matters  of  religion,  forbearing  to  repair  to  Church,  or  the 
exercising  of  any  mode  of  worship  whatever"  should  be 
repealed,  and  a  universal  exemption  is  made  from  all 
levies,  taxes,  and  impositions  for  the  support  of  the 
church  or  its  ministers.8 

The  struggle  to  secure  relief  from  military  exactions 
was  not  so  soon  over,  and  it  was  in  all  the  Southern 

1  Memorials  (Philadelphia,  1787)  quoted  from  Weeks,  p.  151. 

2  Hening,  ix.  112. 

*  Hening,  ix.  164,  312,  387,  496.  The  Church,  however,  was  not  dis 
established  in  Virginia  until  1799,  though  more  than  two-thirds  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  Colony  were  dissenters  when  the  Bill  of  Rights  was  adopted. 


CH.II  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  319 

colonies  a  prolific  source  of  suffering.  In  an  enactment 
of  the  Virginia  legislature  in  the  year  1666  it  is  noted 
that  "  divers  refractory  persons  refuse  to  appeare  upon  the 
dayes  of  exercise  [of  the  militia]  and  other  times  when 
required  to  attend  upon  the  publique  service,"  and  a  fine 
of  one  hundred  pounds  of  tobacco  is  imposed  for  such 
neglect.1 

A  minute  of  Henrico  Monthly  Meeting  under  date  of 
5th  July  1729  shows  what  happened  when  the  fine  was 
not  paid,  and  also  what  Friends  considered  was  "  for  the 
honour  of  Truth." 

"  Our  Friend  Tarlton  Woodson  having  related  to  this  Meeting 
his  case  of  having  had  a  horse  wrongfully  seazed  by  the  sheriff 
for  a  Melishey  fine,  for  not  bearing  arms  according  as  the  Law 
directs,  and  desires  of  this  Meeting  advice  whather  he  may  sew 
[sue]  the  sd.  auficer  for  not  acting  according  to  Law.  This 
Meeting  after  deliberate  concideration  think  it  may  redound 
more  to  the  honour  of  Truth  to  suffer  wrong  patiently  than  to 
take  a  remedy  at  Law." 

By  an  act  of  1738  Friends  were  exempted  from 
military  service,  but  were  required  to  furnish  a  substitute, 
which,  for  their  conscientious  ideas,  was  no  relief  at  all, 
and  the  records  for  the  next  quarter  of  a  century  are  full 
of  accounts  of  distraints  for  military  fines,2  and  the  period 
of  the  French  and  Indian  war  was  a  time  of  very  great 
suffering  on  the  part  of  Friends  in  Virginia  as  well  as 
everywhere  else.  Under  the  law  of  1756,  providing  that 
every  twentieth  man  should  be  drafted  for  the  war,  seven 
young  Friends  were  carried  to  the  frontier.  They  appear 
to  have  remained  faithful  to  "  the  Truth "  in  their  hard 
trial,  and  the  Virginia  Epistle  to  London  in  1757  reports 
that  the  young  men  are  now  released  from  imprisonment. 

1  Hening,  ii.  246. 

2  Minutes  of  this  type  can  be  found  in  every  Record  Book  : 

For  not  bearing  arms         Thomas  Pleasants         500  Ibs.  tobacco, 
ti  »  , ,         Ephrim  Gartrite  500    ,,         ,, 

ii  ii  .1         John  Crew,  for  300    ,,         ,, 

a  mare  worth     ....   £(>     o     o 
11  i>  ,,         John  Lead,  a  bedd  and  pair  of  sheets 

worth          .  .         .  j£6     o     o 

i,  I*  ii         Thomas  Ellyson,  for    500  Ibs.  tobacco 

a  man  (i.e.  slave)  worth       .         -^900 


320  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

A  law  which  furnished  some  relief  was  passed  in  1766. 
This  exempted  Friends  from  "exercising"  at  musters, 
and  they  were  released  from  the  general  requirement  to 
provide  a  set  of  arms.  The  militia  officer  of  each  county 
was  required  to  prepare  a  list  of  all  male  Quakers  of  a 
military  age,  and  no  person  was  exempted  unless  he  could 
prove  that  he  was  a  bona  fide  Quaker.  In  time  of  actual 
war,  however,  the  Quaker  was  still  liable  to  be  drafted, 
though  he  could  furnish  a  substitute  or  pay  a  fine  of  ten 
pounds  sterling.1 

The  meeting  records  show  many  entries  like  the 
following : 

"  At  our  monthly  meeting  held  at  the  Western  Branch  in  Isle 
of  Wight  County  in  Virginia  the  27th  of  the  6  month  1757  : 

"  The  overseers  of  each  meeting  are  desired  to  collect  the 
names  of  each  of  their  members  that  are  liable  by  a  late  act  of 
assembly  to  be  enlisted  in  the  militia  against  our  next  monthly 
meeting,  that  a  list  may  be  given  to  the  Colonel  or  chief 
commanding  officer  of  each  county  as  by  Act  of  assembly 
directed ;  and  have  the  indulgence  granted  by  the  same."  z 

At  the  beginning  of  its  colonial  history  North  Carolina 
possessed  a  very  large  measure  of  religious  freedom.  In 
the  earliest  charter  granted  by  King  Charles  II.  to  eight 
of  his  favourites  in  1663,  and  extended  in  1665,  toleration 
of  dissenters  was  provided  for,  though  it  was  assumed 
that  the  Church  of  England  would  be  the  Church  in  the 
Carolinas.  The  terms  offered  to  the  settlers  at  Cape 
Fear  in  1665  show  an  unusual  breadth  of  toleration  for 
that  century  : 

"No  person  .  .  .  shall  be  any  ways  molested,  punished, 
disquieted,  or  called  in  question  for  any  differences  in  opinion  or 
practice  in  matters  of  religious  concernment,  but  every  person 
shall  have  and  enjoy  his  conscience  in  matters  of  religion 
throughout  all  the  province."8 

1  Hening,  viii.  241. 

s  The  difficulties  on  account  of  military  requirements  were  by  no  means  at  an 
end  in  1767.  The  Friends  had  much  to  suffer  during  the  Revolution,  and  fines 
for  refusal  to  train  in  the  militia  were  imposed  for  many  years  after  the  Colony 
was  a  state. 

3  Colony  Records  of  North  Carolina,  i.  80-8 1. 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  321 

Locke's  Fundamental  Constitution  for  the  Carolinas 
provided  that  any  seven  persons  agreeing  in  any  religion 
should  be  constituted  "  a  Church  or  profession  to  which 
they  shall  give  some  name  to  distinguish  it  from  others," 
and  this  Fundamental  Constitution  provided  that  no 
person  of  one  faith  should  disturb  or  molest  the  religious 
assemblies  of  others,  nor  persecute  them  for  opinions  in 
religion  or  for  their  ways  of  worship.1  Everything  possible 
was  done  by  the  proprietors  to  invite  dissenters  to  come 
to  the  new  colony,  and  Friends  were  not  slow  to  take 
advantage  of  the  open  door.  The  Established  Church 
did  absolutely  nothing  in  the  colony  and  had  no  minister 
there  before  1 700.  For  a  quarter  of  a  century  Quakerism 
was  the  only  organised  form  of  Christianity  in  the  colony, 
and,  as  Weeks  says  : 

"  When  the  eighteenth  century  dawned,  the  Quakers,  by  their 
thorough  organization  and  by  their  earnest  preaching,  by  their 
simple  and  devoted  lives,  by  their  faithfulness  and  love,  had 
gathered  into  their  fold  many  men  and  women  who  primarily 
belonged  to  other  denominations.  They  became  Friends  and 
remained  faithful  to  their  new-found  form  of  belief." 2 

During  this  period  of  freedom,  Quakerism  had,  as  the 
next  chapter  will  show,  a  large  and  influential  share  in 
shaping  the  political  development  of  the  Colony,  and  the 
story  of  the  struggle  for  freedom  from  tithes  and  from 
bearing  arms  during  the  eighteenth  century  will  be  told 
in  that  chapter. 

Most  of  the  travelling  Friends  who  visited  the  Southern 
colonies  in  the  eighteenth  century — and  even  earlier — 
felt  a  strong  concern  against  the  ownership  of  slaves, 
though  it  was  not  until  1760  that  this  subj'ect  really 
gripped  the  consciences  of  the  Friends  who  lived  in  these 
colonies.3  It  seems  to  us  now  somewhat  amazing  that  a 

1  This  Fundamental  Constitution  drawn  up  by  John  Locke  is  printed  in  the 
Colony  Records  of  North  Carolina,  i.  pp.  187-207. 

2  Religious  Development  in  North  Carolina,  p.  32. 

3  A  Minute  of  Maryland  Half  Year's  Meeting  of  Women  Friends  for   1678 
shows  that  even  at  this  early  period  the  Quaker  women  were  sensitive  in   the 
matter  of  a  true  and  kindly  treatment  of  the  children  of  the  negro  race,  and  that 
they  considered  it  important  to  have  their  own  children  trained  in  courtesy  toward 
and  reverence  for  others.     The  minute  is  dated  June  18,  1678,  and  reads  : 

' '  We  are  informed  of  a  ffriend's  Children  that  belonged  to  West  River  Meetting 

y 


322  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

man  so  enlightened  and  so  sensitively  conscientious  as 
Wenlock  Christison — a  man  who  was  ready  to  die  for  his 
faith — could  have  bought  and  sold  slaves,  but  such  is  the 
fact.  He  owned  a  number  of  white  slaves,  evidently 
immigrants  sold  for  debt,  but  there  is  also  evidence  that 
he  bought  and  owned  negroes  ;  for  a  minute  of  Tred- 
haven  Monthly  Meeting,  under  date  of  September  27, 
1 68 1,  informs  that  "one  Diggs"  has  sued  the  executors 
of  Wenlock  Christison,  concerning  some  negroes  sent  by 
Wenlock  Christison  out  of  Barbadoes  to  this  country," 
and  three  years  later  William  Dixon,  who  married 
Wenlock  Christison's  widow,  asks  the  advice  of  the 
Monthly  Meeting  about  "  selling  a  negro  his  freedom." 
This  attitude  toward  the  existence  of  slavery  seems  to 
have  gone  on  pretty  much  unchanged  until  the  time  of 
the  visit  of  Samuel  Fothergill  of  England  (1754)  and 
John  Woolman's  second  visit  (1757) — both  well-beloved 
disciples  of  liberty.  Fothergill,  who  was  deeply  stirred 
on  the  subject,  wrote :  "  The  price  of  blood  is  upon  that 
province  [Maryland]  —  I  mean  their  purchasing  and 
keeping  negroes  in  slavery."  Of  North  Carolina  he 
writes,  "  Friends  have  been  a  lively  people  here,  but 
Negro-purchasing  comes  more  and  more  in  use  among 
them." 1  Woolman's  first  journey  through  Maryland  and 
Virginia  was  in  1746,  of  which  he  writes,  with  his  usual 
sensitiveness : 

"  Two  things  were  remarkable  to  me  in  this  journey :  first,  in 
regard  to  my  entertainment.  When  I  ate,  drank,  and  lodged 
free-cost  with  people  who  lived  in  ease  on  the  hard  labour  of 
their  slaves  I  felt  uneasy ;  and  as  my  mind  was  inward  toward 
the  Lord,  I  found  this  uneasiness  return  upon  me,  at  times, 
through  the  whole  visit.  Where  the  masters  bore  a  good  share 

that  they  are  very  badly  and  Corruptly  Educated  concerning  the  importance  of 
strict  justice  being  duly  attended  to  on  account  of  the  Affricans  and  their  Posterity 
formerly  in  Slavery,  in  regard  to  Christian  instruction,  Education,  and  Treatment 
towards  the  Youth  of  that  race,  as  well  as  the  circumstances  of  those  more 
advanced  in  years,  which  it  is  desired  may  have  place  amongst  us,  and  the  weight 
of  the  subject  rests  on  the  mind  of  friends,  now  assembled,  that  when  we  return  to 
our  several  Meetings  we  may  be  enabled  to  impress  on  the  minds  of  our  Brethren 
and  Sisters  a  close  consideration  of  what  may  be  called  for  at  our  hands  in  regard 
to  this  People,  in  consequence  of  our  high  profession  of  Justice  and  Equity." 
1  Memoirs,  pp.  282  and  283. 


CH.  n  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  323 

of  the  burden,  and  lived  frugally,  so  that  their  servants  were  well 
provided  for,  and  their  labour  moderate,  I  felt  more  easy ;  but 
where  they  lived  in  a  costly  way,  and  laid  heavy  burdens  on 
their  slaves,  my  exercise  was  often  great,  and  I  frequently  had 
conversation  with  them  in  private  concerning  it.  Secondly,  this 
trade  of  importing  slaves  from  their  native  country  being  much 
encouraged  amongst  them,  and  the  white  people  and  their 
children  so  generally  living  without  much  labour,  was  frequently 
the  subject  of  my  serious  thoughts.  I  saw  in  these  southern 
provinces  so  many  vices  and  corruptions,  increased  by  this  trade 
and  this  way  of  life,  that  it  appeared  to  me  as  a  dark  gloominess 
hanging  over  the  land ;  and  though  now  many  willingly  run  into 
it,  yet  in  future  the  consequences  will  be  grievous  to  posterity. 
I  express  it  as  it  hath  appeared  to  me,  not  once,  nor  twice,  but 
as  a  matter  fixed  on  my  mind." 

At  the  time  of  his  visit  in  1757  he  found  himself 
constrained  by  his  conscience  not  to  accept  free  entertain 
ment  in  Friends'  homes  where  there  were  slaves,  and  on 
leaving  such  homes  he  put  money  in  the  hands  of  his 
host,  asking  him  to  distribute  it  among  the  negroes.  He 
took  great  pains  to  make  Friends  see  the  evil  effects — 
spiritually,  morally,  socially,  and  economically — from  slave 
labour,  prophesying,  with  clear  insight,  that  if  Friends 
"  prefer  their  outward  prospects  of  gain  to  all  other 
consideration,  and  do  not  act  conscientiously  toward  their 
fellow-creatures,  I  believe  the  burden  will  grow  heavier 
and  heavier.1  He  urged  more  care  in  the  education  of 
negroes  and  greater  endeavours  to  guide  them  in  moral 
and  religious  matters,  "  as  souls  for  whom  Christ  died," 
and  at  Virginia  Yearly  Meeting  he  was  deeply  disturbed 
in  spirit  to  note  that,  in  adopting  the  Query  of  Philadelphia 
Yearly  Meeting,  "  Are  there  any  concerned  in  the  im 
portation  of  negroes,  or  in  buying  them  after  they  are 
imported  ? "  they  had  changed  it  to  read  :  "  Are  any 
concerned  in  the  importation  of  negroes  or  buying  them 
to  trade  in  ?  '*  He  spoke  strongly  against  this  change. 
He  wrote  a  beautiful  epistle  to  the  new  Meetings  in  what 
he  calls  "  the  back  settlements  of  North  Carolina  " — New 
Garden  and  Cane  Creek — in  which  he  says :  "  To  rational 

1  Journal,  p.  104. 


324  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

creatures  bondage  is  uneasy,  and  in  tender  and  most 
affectionate  love  I  beseech  you  to  keep  clear  from 
purchasing  any."  l 

From  this  time  on  there  are  frequent  minutes  dealing 
with  the  care  of  slaves,  gradually  advising  against  the 
purchase  of  them,  and  finally  making  it  "  a  disownable 
offense  "  to  purchase  a  slave.  Maryland  Friends  at  their 
Yearly  Meeting  in  1760  had  a  weighty  consideration  "  of 
their  duty  in  the  matter  of  holding  slaves,"  and  there  was 
"  some  uneasiness  felt  about  the  propriety  of  buying 
negroes."  The  Meeting  for  that  year  limited  itself  to  an 
advice  against  "  importing."  The  year  following  (1761), 
however,  it  adopted  this  minute  : 

"  At  a  Yearly  Meeting  held  at  West  River  last  Spring  relating 
to  Negroes  a  weighty  exercise  revived  in  this  Meeting,  and  a 
solid  conference  was  held  thereon,  and  wholesome  exhortation 
to  attend  to  the  mind  of  Truth,  after  which  this  Meeting  con 
cludes  that  Friends  should  not  in  any  wise  encourage  their 
importation  by  buying  or  selling  those  imported,  or  other  slaves, 
and  that  those  that  have  them  by  inheritance  or  otherwise  should 
be  careful  to  train  them  up  in  the  principles  of  the  Christian 
religion."  2 

From  the  time  of  this  awakening  the  feeling  gradually 
grew  among  Friends  that  it  was  inherently  wrong  to  hold 
slaves  at  all.  Maryland  Yearly  Meeting  of  1772  adopted 
a  minute  "  discouraging  the  iniquitous  practice  of  holding 
slaves "  and  advised  that  Monthly  Meetings  do  extend 
their  care  and  assistance  to  those  who  remain  possessed 
of  these  people,  in  brotherly  affection  and  Christian  tender 
ness,  labouring  in  the  ability  that  may  be  afforded  for 
their  relief." 

1  The  account  of  this  important  visit  of  Woolman  through  the  South  occupies 
chapter  iv.  of  the  Journal. 

3  There  had  been  an  official  care  shown  in  North  Carolina  as  early  as  1740, 
when  the  Yearly  Meeting  recommends  to  those  holding  slaves  ' '  to  use  them  as 
fellow-creatures  and  not  to  make  too  rigorous  an  exaction  of  labour  from  them." 
Even  as  early  as  1722,  Virginia  Yearly  Meeting  asked  the  Query:  "Are  all 
Friends  clear  of  being  concerned  in  the  importation  of  slaves,  or  purchasing  them 
for  sale  ?  Do  they  use  those  well  they  are  possessed  of,  and  do  they  endeavour 
to  restrain  from  vice,  and  to  instruct  them  in  the  principles  of  the  Christian 
religion  ?  " — Weeks,  p.  201. 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  325 

Five  years  later  the  Friends  of  Maryland  came  to  this 
vigorous  conclusion,  that : 

"  should  any  of  the  members  of  our  Religious  Society  remain  so 
regardless  of  the  advices  of  this  Meeting  from  time  to  time 
communicated,  as  to  continue  to  hold  mankind  in  a  state  of 
slavery  the  subscription  of  such  for  the  use  of  the  Society  ought  not  in 
future  to  be  received,  and  in  order  that  Truth's  testimony  may  be 
clearly  maintained  against  this  oppressive  practice,  our  several 
Quarterly  and  Monthly  Meetings  are  earnestly  enjoined  to 
extend  their  help  and  assistance  to  such  in  profession  with  us, 
as  have  hitherto  neglected  to  do  justice  to  that  oppressed  people, 
and  if  any  should  continue  so  far  to  justify  their  conduct  as  to 
refuse  or  reject  the  tender  advice  of  their  brethren,  it  is  the 
solid  sense  and  judgment  of  this  Meeting  that  their  continuing 
in  this  oppressive  practice  is  become  so  burdensome,  that  such 
persons  must  be  discontinued  from  our  Religious  Society."  1 

Similar  minutes  appear  in  the  records  of  Virginia  and 
North  Carolina  with  a  very  similar  ripening  of  anti- 
slavery  sentiment.  In  1767  Western  Branch  Monthly 
Meeting  in  Virginia  took  this  tentative  position : 

"  It  is  the  Judgment  of  this  meeting  that  no  Friends  for  the 
future  doe  purchase  any  slaves  without  first  applying  and  have 
the  consent  of  the  Monthly  Meeting,  except  it  be  for  securing 
of  such  debts  as  cannot  otherwise  be  got." 

Sentiment  developed  so  rapidly  that  the  Yearly  Meet 
ing  of  1768  adopted  this  conclusion  : 

"  The  subject  of  negroes,  being  brought  before  the  Meeting, 
and  duly  and  weightily  considered,  it  appears  to  be  the  sense  of 
the  Meeting,  and  accordingly  is  agreed  to,  that  in  order  to 
prevent  an  increase  of  them  in  our  Society,  none  of  our  members 
far  the  time  to  come  shall  be  permitted  to  purchase  a  negroe,  or  any 
other  slave,  without  being  guilty  of  a  breach  of  our  Discipline,  and 
accountable  for  the  same  to  their  Monthly  Meeting." 

This  strenuous  action  produced  considerable  opposition, 
and  the  subject  came  up  again  in  the  Yearly  Meeting  of 
1772,  with  much  the  same  result : 

"  The  sense  of  this  Meeting  being  requested  upon  the  minute 
of  1768,  prohibiting  the  purchase  of  Negroes,  whether  or  not 

1  Minute  of  Baltimore  Yearly  Meeting  for  1777. 


326  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

the  Monthly  Meetings  ought  to  disown  such  as  do  purchase 
[Negroes]  which  matter  having  been  duly  and  weightily  con 
sidered,  it  is  the  unanimous  sense  of  this  Meeting,  that  if  any 
professing  themselves  members  of  our  Society,  shall  purchase  a 
Negro,  or  other  slave,  with  no  other  view  but  tJieir  own  benefit  or 
convenience^  and  knowing  it  to  be  contrary  to  the  rules  of  our 
Discipline,  the  Monthly  Meeting  to  which  they  belong  ought  to 
testify  their  disunion  with  such  persons,  until  they  condemn  their 
conduct  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  Meeting." 1 

One  of  the  most  prominent  opponents  of  slave-holding 
that  America  produced  in  the  eighteenth  century  was 
Warner  Mifflin,  who  was  born  in  Accomack  county, 
Virginia,  in  1745.  He  determined  in  his  youth  never 
to  be  a  slave-holder,  but  he  became  possessed  of  slaves 
through  his  wife,  Elizabeth  Johns,  and  he  also  received 
some  from  his  father.  He,  however,  soon  returned  to  the 
conviction  of  his  youth,  and  by  the  year  1775  he  had 
unconditionally  emancipated  all  the  slaves  who  belonged 
to  him.  From  that  time  until  his  death  in  1798  he 
assiduously  laboured  to  promote  emancipation ;  but  as 
he  had  in  early  life  moved  into  Delaware,  the  story  of 
his  splendid  efforts  toward  freedom  does  not  belong  to 
this  chapter.2 

In  North  Carolina  a  minute  was  adopted  in  1772 
advising  Friends  not  to  buy  negroes  except  of  Friends, 
or  to  prevent  the  separation  of  husband  and  wife,  or 
parent  and  child,  or  with  the  approval  of  the  Monthly 
Meeting,  and  in  1776  the  Yearly  Meeting  earnestly  and 
affectionately  advised  Friends  to  "  cleanse  their  hands  of 
slaves  as  soon  as  they  /possibly  can,"  and  further,  "  any 
member  of  this  meeting  who  may  hereafter  buy,  sell,  or 
clandestinely  assign  for  hire  any  slave  in  such  manner 
as  may  perpetuate  or  prolong  their  slavery"  was  to  be 
disowned.3 

From  the  period  of  the  war  of  the  Revolution  it  was 

1  Owing  to  the  fact  that  it  was  against  the  law  of  the  Colony  to  manumit  a 
slave  Friends  in  Virginia  found  it  difficult  to  free  the  slaves  they  owned,  and  they 
endeavoured  in  vain  in  1770  to  get  this  law  repealed. 

8  See  Life  and  Ancestry  of  Warner  Mijflin,  compiled  by  Hilda  Justice 
(Phila.,  1905). 

*  Weeks,  p.  208. 


CH.  ii  GROUP  LIFE  AND  WORK  327 

clearly  settled  in  all  the  Southern  Colonies  that  no  Friend 
was  to  buy  a  slave,  and  that  as  fast  as  possible  those 
negroes  owned  by  members  of  the  Society  should  be 
given  their  freedom  and  provided  for.  From  this  time, 
too,  a  feeling  of  responsibility  for  the  education  of  the 
negroes  grew  upon  Friends,  and  there  are  many  minutes 
in  the  Records  of  the  last  quarter  of  the  eighteenth 
century  providing  for  the  enlightenment  of  the  coloured 
people. 

This  chapter  has  dealt  only  slightly  with  the  deeper 
aspect  of  the  religion  of  these  Quakers  in  the  South — the 
essence  and  heart  of  their  religion,  their  personal  experience 
of  life  with  Christ.  They  did  not,  during  the  period  we 
have  been  studying,  produce  many  great  interpreters  of 
the  fundamental  Quaker  idea,  they  added  very  little  to 
the  prophetic  literature  of  the  movement,  and  they  have, 
therefore,  left  scant  material  for  the  formation  of  an 
estimate  of  their  inward  power.  The  voluminous  Records 
of  their  meetings  and  the  Journals  of  their  visitors,  how 
ever,  leave  the  impression  with  the  reader  that  they 
formed,  in  their  various  localities,  live  centres  of  an 
efficient  spiritual  religion.  There  was  considerable  re 
iteration  of  their  central  doctrine  of  the  inward  Light  too 
often  presented,  perhaps,  in  rather  dull  fashion,  with  too 
little  psychological  insight  of  its  meaning  and  too  little 
of  the  warm  and  tender  message  of  the  Light  revealed  in 
the  concrete  Person  of  Galilee  and  Jerusalem.  There  was, 
it  is  certain,  too  much  of  the  scribal  concern  over  dress, 
speech,  and  "  testimonies  "  grown  sacred  with  age.  But 
there  was,  nevertheless,  something  very  real  and  vital  in 
these  Quaker  groups.  They  kept  alive  a  true  democracy 
in  which  all  persons  were  spiritually  equal,  they  exhibited 
a  congregation  governing  itself  and  uttering  itself  through 
the  members  themselves,  even  the  simplest.  They  showed, 
too,  in  their  meetings  for  worship  an  overwhelming  sense 
of  the  real  presence — a  hush  and  awe  of  spirit  before  the 
God  of  the  outer  and  inner  universe. 

Almost  all  the  Journals  of  the  itinerant  ministers 
inform  us  that  they  found  in  their  travels  among  the 


328  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

people  at  large  religion  at  a  low  ebb,  but  there  was  kept 
alive  in  these  Quaker  centres  a  type  of  religion  which  was 
in  some  sense  quickened  with  streams  from  the  living 
Fountain,  and  which  produced  real  flower  and  fruit  in 
spiritually  ordered  lives — what  Fothergill  calls,  "a  lively 
remnant  in  this  land,"  "  purified  hearts  in  which  the  word 
of  the  Lord  God  grows."  *  They  were  more  sensitive,  I 
think,  than  their  neighbours  to  the  meaning  of  social 
evils,  and  they  were  more  intensely  concerned  to  be  in 
harmony  with  the  will  of  God.  They  failed,  where  so 
many  others  have  failed,  by  building  little  tabernacles 
over  their  mounts  of  vision,  by  trying  to  keep  for  them 
selves  a  Light  meant  for  the  race,  and  by  failing  to  grasp, 
intelligently,  their  principle  of  religion,  which  became  to 
them  a  kind  of  fetish,  untranslatable  to  the  world  about 
them  ;  but  they  did  bless  the  world  by  producing  here 
and  there,  now  and  then,  specimens  of  personal  lives, 
penetrated  by  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  radiant  with  His  Light, 
taking  upon  themselves  the  burdens  of  the  world  and 
living  in  a  busy  and  material  world  as  though  they  knew 
that  their  main  business  here  was  to  help  to  bring  in  the 
kingdom  of  peace  and  love  and  brotherhood.  In  so  far 
as  they  did  that,  they  succeeded. 

1  Samuel  Fothergill's  Memoirs,  p.  166. 


CHAPTER    III 

SOUTHERN    QUAKERS    IN    PUBLIC    LIFE 

WHEREVER  the  Quakers,  in  the  early  colonial  period, 
found  avenues  open  for  political  activity  they  entered 
them  by  a  sort  of  natural  instinct.  There  were  in  this 
creative  stage  of  Quakerism,  no  scruples  against  a  political 
career.  On  the  contrary,  the  foremost  Friends  felt  a 
profound  responsibility  laid  upon  them  to  work  out  their 
principles  of  the  Light  within,  in  the  fields  of  political 
life.  Rhode  Island  and  Pennsylvania  furnish  the  most 
massive  illustration  of  this  statement,  for  these  colonies 
offered  the  best  conditions,  but  the  same  tendency  appears 
everywhere  where  the  Quakers  were  numerous — the 
tendency  to  put  their  ideas  into  actual  operation.  In  fact, 
John  Archdale,  Governor-General  of  the  Carolinas,  is  one 
of  the  most  interesting  figures  in  the  entire  list  of  public 
Quakers,  and  for  a  brief  period  this  great  colony  of  the 
Restoration  seemed  likely  to  have  its  career  and  destiny 
shaped  by  Quaker  statesmen. 

Maryland  and  Virginia  presented  but  slender  oppor 
tunities  for  Quaker  activity  in  public  life,  and  the  story 
of  political  activity  in  these  two  colonies  is  soon  told. 
The  early  "  convincements "  in  Maryland  included  a 
number  of  public  men.  William  Durand,  who  was 
"convinced"  by  Elizabeth  Harris  in  1656/7,  was  a 
member  of  Cromwell's  commission  for  the  government  of 
Maryland,  and  was  the  secretary  of  that  commission.1 
He  seems  soon  after — apparently  at  the  Restoration — to 
have  moved  to  Carolina  and  to  have  settled  a  plantation 

1  Archives  of  Maryland,  \.  339,  355. 
329 


330  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

on  the  Roanoke,  and  the  George  Durand  conspicuous  in 
early  Carolina  history  was  apparently  his  son.1 

Another  of  Elizabeth  Harris's  converts  was  Robert 
Clarkson,  who  served  his  colony  for  some  time  in  the 
House  of  Burgesses  as  member  from  Ann  Arundel  County. 

Thomas  Meares  and  William  Burges  were  two  im 
portant  public  servants  of  the  colony  who  became  Quakers. 
They  frequently  appear  in  the  Records  of  the  colony  as 
judicial  commissioners,  justices  of  the  peace,  and  members 
of  the  Assembly,  and  in  1657  they  both  refused  to  take 
the  oath  of  office,  declaring  that  it  was  "  not  lawful  in  any 
case  to  swear,"  though  they  had  formerly  done  so  without 
compunction.  These  two  above  named  members  of  the 
Assembly  from  Ann  Arundel  County,  and  Michael 
Brookes  for  Calvert  County,  were  fined,  October  6,  1657, 
for  refusing  the  oath.2  Thomas  Meares  appears  again  as 
a  member  of  the  Assembly  in  1663,  and  Michael  Brooks 
also  figures  in  the  Records  as  a  member,  in  spite  of  the 
difficulty  over  the  oath,  and  he  was  put  forward  for 
positions  of  trust  and  public  service.3  Dr.  Peter  Sharpe 
is  another  of  the  early  Quakers  in  Maryland  who  was 
prominent  in  public  life  and  political  activity.  He,  too, 
was  entrusted  by  the  Assembly,  of  which  he  was  a 
member,  with  important  colonial  matters.4  Thomas 
Taylor  was  "  convinced "  by  George  Fox's  preaching  in 
1673.  He  was  at  the  time  Speaker  of  the  Lower  House 
and  one  of  the  most  influential  men  in  public  affairs. 
He  went  to  hear  Fox  preach  at  William  Cole's  house  on 
the  Western  Shore  and  was  so  impressed  that  he  drove 
seven  miles  the  next  day  to  attend  another  meeting  at 
Abraham  Birkhead's  house.  Here  at  a  "  blessed  meeting  " 
the  Speaker  was  "  convinced,"  and  he  seems  to  have 
stayed  "  convinced,"  for  a  little  later  a  meeting  was  held  in 
his  house.5  He  continued  for  many  years  in  legislative 

1  See  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  306. 

2  Archives  of  Maryland,  iii.  358. 

3  Ibid.,  i.  359,  362. 

4  Ibid. ,  i.  p.  362.     Peter  Sharpe  left  in  his  will,  "for  perpetual  standing  a 
horse  for  the  use  of  Friends  in  the  ministry  !  "     See  Davis's  Day  Star,  p.  78. 

6  Fox's  Journal,  ii.  182  and  194. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS   IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  331 

service.  His  name  occurs  seventy-one  times  in  the 
Records  of  the  Assembly  between  1666  and  1676,  and 
he  was  also  a  member  of  the  Governor's  Council. 

William  Berry,  too,  a  leader  in  all  the  affairs  of  the 
new  Society,  a  hospitable  entertainer  of  travelling  Friends, 
a  liberal  subscriber  to  the  funds  of  the  meeting,  was  for 
some  years  a  deputy  in  the  Assembly,  beginning  his  term 
of  service  in  1674.  He  was  frequently  selected  for 
important  committee  work,  and  appears  to  have  enjoyed 
the  trust  and  confidence  of  the  colonial  officials.1 

The  most  interesting  Quaker  in  politics  in  this  colony 
was,  however,  the  old  persecution-tried  pioneer  of  Quaker 
ism,  Wenlock  Christison  of  Talbot  County,  who  had  sat 
in  the  shadow  of  the  Boston  gallows.  He  settled  in 
Maryland  probably  in  1670.  In  that  year  Dr.  Peter 
Sharpe  transferred  a  piece  of  land,  containing  one  hundred 
and  fifty  acres — one  of  the  finest  sites  on  the  Chesapeake 
Eastern  Shore — to  Wenlock  Christison  "  in  consideration 
of  true  affection  and  brotherly  love,"  and  "  also  for  other 
divers  good  causes  and  considerations."  In  1673  another 
Friend,  John  Edmondson,  also  "  out  of  brotherly  love," 
gave  him  a  hundred  acres  more,  adjoining  his  "  Peter 
Sharpe  farm,"  while  a  third  Friend,  Henry  Wilcocks, 
presented  him  with  "a  serving-man,"  named  Francis 
Lloyd.2  He  was  thus  a  well-provided  citizen.  His  house 
was  the  place  of  assembly  for  the  Friends'  meetings 
and  he  was  the  foremost  Quaker  minister  in  the  colony.8 

His  first  public  service  on  record  was  to  prepare,  with 
three  other  Friends,  one  of  them  being  William  Berry,  a 
petition  to  the  Governor,  the  Council,  and  the  Assembly 
for  the  passage  of  an  Act  allowing  the  substitution  of  an 
affirmation  for  an  oath.  It  was  an  able,  straightforward 
document,  and  was  referred  to  Lord  Baltimore,  "  who  hath 
formerly  had  Intentions  of  Gratifieing  the  desire  of  sd 

1  See  Archives  of  Maryland,  ii.  passim. 

2  See  Samuel  A.  Harrison's  Wenlock  Christison  (Baltimore  1878),  pp.  52-54. 

3  Peter   Sharpe,   in   his   will,    left  forty  shillings  apiece  ' '  to  Friends  in  ye 
ministry,  viz.   Alice  Gary,  William  Cole,  Sarah  Mash  [Marsh],  if  then  in  being  ; 
Winlock  Christeson  and  his  wife,  John  Burnett  [probably  Burnyeat]  and  Daniel 
Gould  [Burnyeat's  companion]." — Davis's  Day  Star,  p.  78. 


332   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

people  called  Quakers."  It  was,  however,  finally  decided 
that  it  would  be  "  utterly  unsafe  to  make  a  Law  in  this 
Province  to  exempt  the  people  thereof  from  testifying 
upon  oath."  l  Christison  and  his  friend  John  Edmondson, 
both  of  Talbot  County,  were  chosen  deputies  to  the 
Assembly  in  1678.  What  they  did  about  the  oath  of 
office  we  have  no  way  of  knowing,  but  they  were  at  all 
events  enrolled  as  members  of  the  Lower  House  the  2ist 
of  October  i678.2  Christison  at  once  received  important 
appointments  to  service  for  the  House  and  was,  strangely 
enough,  selected  to  serve  on  a  Committee  of  six  to  prepare 
an  "  Act  for  the  Security  and  Defense  of  the  Province  " 
and  for  drawing  up  the  "  necessary  articles  of  Warre  ! "  3 
There  is  no  way  of  discovering  what  this  peace-loving 
Quaker  did  on  the  military  Committee,  though  the 
Records  plainly  show  that  he  accepted  the  appointment, 
and  that  he  received  nine  hundred  pounds  of  tobacco  from 
the  colony  for  his  service  as  a  deputy.4  In  1681,  the 
Records  of  the  Lower  House  announce  a  vacancy  in 
the  representation  from  Talbot  County  due  to  the  death 
of  Wenlock  Christison.5  His  fellow-member,  John 
Edmondson,  had  a  much  longer  term  of  service,  and  was 
throughout  his  period  of  service  on  important  standing 
committees.  September  6,  1681,  William  Berry  and 
Richard  Johns,  both  apparently  at  the  time  members  of 
the  Lower  House,  introduced  another  petition  urging  the 
privilege  of  affirmation,  which  they  presented  so  effectively 
that  the  House  adopted  the  following  Resolution : 

"If  the  Rights  and  Privileges  of  a  freeborn  Englishman, 
settled  on  him  by  Magna  Charta  and  often  confirmed  by 
subsequent  Parliaments,  can  be  preserved  by  yea  and  nay  in 
wills  and  testaments  and  other  occurients,  the  Lower  House 
may  do  well  to  prepare  such  a  Law."  6 

The    Friends   followed  up   this   favourable   action  by 

1  Archives  of  Maryland,  ii.  355.  2  Ibid.,  vii.  7. 

3  Ibid.,  vii.  19.  4  Ibid.,  vii.  87. 

6  Ibid.,  vii.  134.     The  actual  "Act  of  Security  and  Defense"  was  not  drawn 
up  until  after  Christison's  death.     See  Ibid.,  vii.  143. 
8  Ibid. ,  vii.  153. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS   IN   PUBLIC  LIFE  333 

presenting  a  paper  giving  six  reasons  for  a  modification 
of  the  law  on  oaths.  In  their  dignified  address,  taking 
up  the  reference  to  Magna  Charta,  they  said :  "  We  are 
Englishmen  ourselves,  and  freeborn,  although  in  scorn 
commonly  called  Quakers,  and  therefore  so  far  from  desiring 
the  least  breach  of  Magna  Charta,  or  of  the  least  privileges 
belonging  to  a  freeborn  Englishman,  we  had  rather  suffer 
many  degrees  more  than  we  do  (if  that  were  possible) 
than  willingly  admit  the  least  violation  of  those  ancient 
rights  and  liberties  which  are  our  birthright.  And  had 
we  not  been  full  well  assured  that  our  sufferings  may  be 
redressed  and  our  request  granted  without  violating 
Magna  Charta  in  the  least  degree  we  would  not  have 
desired  it ! "  If  William  Berry  and  John  Edmondson 
and  Richard  Johns  wrote  that  document  they  were  good 
men  to  represent  the  Society  of  Friends  in  Maryland. 
The  Bill  passed  the  Lower  House  but  did  not  at  that 
time  receive  Lord  Baltimore's  approval.1  He,  however, 
issued  a  proclamation  in  1688  making  an  oath  unneces 
sary  in  testamentary  cases,  for  which  act  the  Quarterly 
Meeting  at  Herring  Creek  sent  him  an  address  of  appre 
ciation,  and  in  1702  Friends  were  entirely  relieved  of 
the  oath. 

It  was  during  the  session  of  the  Assembly  in  the 
autumn  of  1681  that  Lord  Baltimore  announced  to  both 
Houses  that  "  moved  by  the  frequent  clamours  of  the 
Quakers,"  he  was  resolved  henceforth  to  publish  to  the 
people  the  Proceedings  of  all  the  Assemblies 2 — surely  a 
distinct  right  of  the  people.  In  1682  the  Lower  House 
voted  that  "  no  member  whatsoever  be  at  any  time  during 
the  sitting  of  this  House,  admitted  with  his  hatt  on  ! " 8 
This  was  presumably  directed  against  the  Quaker  members, 
and  yet  in  spite  of  this  vote,  two  years  later,  in  a  speech 
before  the  Assembly,  Lord  Baltimore  reproves  certain 
members  "  for  rudely  presuming  to  come  before  his  Lord 
ship  with  their  hats  on,"  which  would  indicate  that  there 
were  a  number  of  Quakers  still  in  the  House. 

1  See  Neill's  English  Colonies  in  America,  pp.  305-306. 
1  Archives  of  Maryland,  vii.  221.  "  Ibid.,  vii.  353. 


334  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

There  were,  too,  many  members  of  the  Society  of 
Friends  at  this  time  occupying  judicial  positions  in  the 
colony.  In  Talbot  County  in  1685  three  out  of  the  ten 
judges  of  the  county  were  Quakers — William  Sharpe, 
William  Stephens,  one  of  Fox's  "  convincements,"  and 
Ralph  Fishbourne,  a  prominent  member  of  the  meeting. 

This  Quaker  activity  was  not  allowed  to  pass  un 
challenged.  The  "  practical  politicians "  of  the  time 
circulated  a  report  against  the  Friends  who  were  in  the 
Assembly,  charging  that  these  Quaker  members  were  the 
cause  of  "  the  leavyes  [i.e.  taxes]  being  raised  soe  high  !  " 
The  Monthly  Meeting  thereupon  appointed  a  committee 
"  to  treat  with  Lowe  [the  politician  who  made  the  charge] 
for  ye  clearing  of  Friends  and  ye  Truth  !  "  l  "  Truth  " 
was,  for  the  time  being,  "  cleared,"  but  the  feeling  steadily 
grew  in  "  the  Society  "  that  it  was  safer  to  keep  out  of 
politics,  and  Maryland  Friends  in  the  eighteenth  century 
contented  themselves  with  sending  petitions  to  the  legisla 
ture  instead  of  sending  members  to  it,  a  change  of  policy 
which  was  a  distinct  loss  to  the  colony  and  a  still  greater 
loss  to  the  Society  itself.2 

The  opportunities  for  public  service  on  the  part  of 
Friends  in  Virginia  were  very  meagre.  There  were,  how 
ever,  a  number  of  men  in  official  station  who  threw  in 
their  lot  with  the  Quakers,  and  as  a  result  found  them 
selves  relegated  to  private  life.  John  Porter  is  an 
interesting  instance  of  this.  The  story  is  laconically  told 
in  the  Colonial  Records  for  September  12,  1663  : 

"  Whereas  Mr.  John  Hill,  high  sheriff  of  Lower  Norfolk,  hath 
represented  to  the  House  that  Mr.  John  Porter,  one  of  the 
burgesses  of  that  county,  was  loving  to  the  Quakers  and  stood 
well  affected  toward  them  and  had  been  at  their  meetings,  and 
was  so  far  an  Anabaptist  as  to  be  against  the  baptising  of  children; 
upon  which  representation,  the  said  Porter  confessed  himself  to 
have  been  and  to  be  well  affected  to  the  Quakers,  but  he  con 
ceived  his  being  at  their  meetings  could  not  be  proved,  upon 


1  Minute  of  i4th  October  1677. 

8  In  this  particular  Friends  were  in  line  with  the  early  Christians.     Tertullian 
says  (Apol.  xxxviii. ) :  "  Nothing  is  more  alien  to  us  than  politics." 


CH.  in  QUAKERS   IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  335 

which  the  oaths  of  allegiance  and  supremacy  were  tendered  to 
him  which  he  refused  to  take,  whereupon  it  is  ordered  that  the 
said  Porter  be  dismissed  this  House."1 

John  Porter,  junior  (who,  oddly,  was  the  brother  of  the 
above-mentioned  John  Porter,  senior),  was  Justice  of  the 
County  Court  of  Lower  Norfolk,  and  tried  a  witch  case  in 
1659,  and  had  been  High  Sheriff  of  the  county  in  1656. 
He  was  "  convinced "  as  a  Quaker  in  the  early  'sixties, 
and  became  the  foremost  preacher  of  that  section  of  the 
colony.  He  was  again  and  again  arrested  for  preaching, 
and  was  once  sentenced  to  be  transported  from  the  colony. 
Quite  naturally  he  ceased  to  hold  public  office.  John 
Bond  (probably  a  Quaker)  was  declared  "  unfit  to  be 
continued  a  magistrate  and  incapable  henceforth  of  any 
publique  trust  or  employment  because  of  his  factious  and 
schismatical  demeanour?  2 

The  most  interesting  glimpse  we  get  of  Quakers  in 
public  life  at  this  period  comes  from  a  section  of  the 
colony  which  was  claimed  both  by  Virginia  and  Maryland. 
As  soon  as  the  Virginia  Assembly  passed  its  Act  of  1660 
against  the  Quakers,  those  who  were  living  on  the  eastern 
shore  of  Virginia  petitioned  the  Governor  of  Maryland  to 
grant  them  the  privilege  of  moving  up  into  the  limits  of 
his  colony.  The  Governor  of  Maryland  appointed  three 
commissioners,  John  Elzy,  Randall  Revell,  and  Stephen 
Horsey  to  arrange  for  the  settlement  of  such  persons  as 
wished  to  come  over  into  his  Province,  assigning  to  them 
"  any  parts  below  the  Choptank  River," 3  and  a  large 
number  accepted  the  opportunity,  as  we  are  informed  that 
there  were  in  May  1662  "fifty  tithable  persons  seated  at 
Monokin  and  Anamessicks  "  [on  the  eastern  shore  south 
of  Nanticoke  River  4J. 

Colonel  Edmund  Scarborough,  who  was  one  of  the 
original  commissioners  for  the  transfer  of  these  settlers, 
for  some  reason  turned  his  service  over  to  the  Governor 
of  Virginia  and  became  the  agent  of  the  latter  colony  for 

1  Hening,  Statutes  at  Large,  ii.  198.     This  was  John  Porter,  senior. 

2  Hening,  ii.  39. 

8  Archives  of  Maryland,  iii.  469.  *  Ibid.,  iii.  p.  452. 


336  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

collecting  the  rents  of  the  Anamessick  settlers  on  the 
claim  that  they  still  belonged  to  Virginia.  "  Wee  lye," 
the  settlers  write  to  the  authorities  in  Maryland,  "  between 
Sylla  and  Charibdis,  not  knowing  how  to  get  out  of  this 
Labarinth."  I  While  this  somewhat  momentous  issue  was 
being  settled  by  the  two  colonies,  Colonel  Scarborough, 
"  with  forty  horsemen  for  pomp  and  safty,"  arrived  at 
Anamessicks  on  a  Sunday  morning  (October  11,  1663) 
to  force  the  issue.  Here  he  found,  he  says,  "  some 
contemptuous  Quakers  and  a  foole  in  office  "  [evidently 
Stephen  Horsey,  a  Quaker  and  the  Agent  of  the  colony 
of  Maryland.] 

Colonel  Scarborough  well  illustrates  the  usual  official 
attitude  toward  Quakers  in  the  early  period  of  their  history, 
and  his  description  is  coloured  both  with  humour  and 
spleen.  He  arrested  Stephen  Horsey  because  he  would 
not  acknowledge  the  authority  of  Virginia,  and  he  put 
the  "  broad  arrow  "  on  his  door.  He  continues  : 

"  Wee  went  to  ye  house  of  Ambrose  Dixon,  a  Quaker,  where 
a  boat  and  two  men,  belonging  to  Groome's  shipp,  and  two 
running  Quakers  were,  also  George  Johnson  and  Thomas  Price, 
Quakers."  He  found  there  "  a  certain  Hollingsworth,  merchant 
of  a  northern  vessel  [William  Hollingsworth  of  Salem,  Massa 
chusetts],  who  presented  his  request  for  liberty  to  trade,  which  I 
doubted  [i.e.  suspected]  was  some  plott  of  ye  Quakers." 

"Stephen  Horsey,"  he  continues,  "ye  ignorant  yet  insolent 
officer,  a  cooper  by  profession,  who  lived  in  ye  lower  parts  of 
Accomack  [belonging  to  Virginia]  once  elected  a  burgess  by  ye 
common  crowd  and  thrown  out  by  ye  Assembly  for  a  fractious 
and  tumultuous  person,  a  man  repugnant  to  all  gov'mt,  of  all 
sects  yet  professed  by  none,  constant  in  nothing,  but  opposing 
church  government,  his  children  at  great  ages  yet  unchristened. 
He  left  the  lower  parts  [i.e.  Accomack]  to  head  rebellion  at 
Annamessecks.  George  Johnson,  ye  proteus  of  heresy  ...  is 
notorious  for  shifting,  schism  atical  pranks.  Thomas  Price,  a 
creeping  Quaker,  by  trade  a  leather  dresser,  whose  conscience 
would  not  serve  to  dwell  amongst  the  wicked  and  therefore  he 
retired  to  Annamessecks  where  he  hears  much  and  says  nothing 
els  but  that  he  would  not  obey  government,  for  which  he  also 
stands  arrested.  Ambrose  Dixon,  a  caulker  by  profession,  that 

1  Archives  of  Maryland,  iii.  p.  474. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS  IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  337 

lived  long  in  ye  lower  parts  [i.e.  in  Accomack]  was  often  in 
question  for  his  quaking  profession,  removed  to  Annamessecks 
where  he  is  a  prater  of  nonsense.  A  receiver  of  many  Quakers, 
his  house  is  ye  place  of  their  resort  [i.e.  their  meeting-place]. 
Henry  Boston,  an  unmannerly  fellow,  stands  condemned  for 
slighting  and  condemning  the  laws  of  the  county,  a  rebell  to 
gover'mt  and  disobedient  to  authority  .  .  .  hath  not  subscribed 
[i.e.  to  the  oath.]  These  are  all,  except  two  or  three  loose 
fellows  who  follow  the  Quakers  for  scrapps,  whom  a  good  whip 
is  fittest  to  reform."  1 

Stephen  Horsey — "  the  ignorant,  insolent  officer  " — 
became  one  of  the  first  judges  of  the  new  county,  organised 
by  the  government  of  Maryland,  and  he  was  also  the  first 
sheriff  of  the  county,  a  man  of  solidity,  trustworthiness, 
and  large  public  service.  Henry  Boston — "  the  un 
mannerly  fellow  " — and  George  Johnson — "  the  proteus 
of  heresy " — were  both  selected  as  county  Judges ! 
George  Fox  visited  the  Anamessick  region  in  1673 
and  added  many  new  members  to  the  little  Society,  the 
nucleus  of  which  had  migrated  thither  from  the  Accomack 
strip  in  Virginia. 

A  provision  was  made  in  1705  by  the  Legislature  of 
Virginia  which  granted  the  Quakers  of  that  colony  the 
privilege  of  affirmation,  but  the  time  had  already  then 
gone  by  for  them  to  take  up  political  activity  and  then, 
too,  they  still  remained  in  the  thought  of  their  Episcopal 
neighbours  a  people  apart — a  peculiar  sect2 

There  was  at  least  one  interesting  exception  to  the 
aloofness  of  the  Virginian  Quakers  from  the  responsibilities 
of  public  life.  Charles  Lynch,  the  founder  of  Lynchburg, 
and  the  pillar  of  Quakerism  in  that  region  of  the  colony, 

1  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  302.     This  region  became  in  1666  a  part  of 
Somerset  County,  Maryland. 

2  The  provision  referred  to  is  found  in  "An  Act  for  establishing  the  General 
Court  and  settling  the  proceedings  therein."     Section   31   reads:     "Provided 
always,  That  the  people  commonly  called  Quakers,  shall  have  the  same  liberty 
of  giving  their  evidence,  by  way  of  solemn  affirmation  and  declaration,  as  is 
prescribed  by  one  Act  of  Parliament,  Septimo  et  Octavo  Gulielmi  Tertii  Regis, 
intituled  An  act  that  the  solemn  affirmation  and  declaration  of  the  people  called 
Quakers  shall  be  accepted  instead  of  an  oath,  in  the  usval  form  ;  which  said  Act 
of  Parliament,  for  so  much  thereof  as  relates  to  such  affirmation  and  declaration, 
and  for  the  time  of  its  continuance  in  force,  and  not  otherwise,  shall  be,  to  all 
intents  and  purposes,  in  full  force  within  this  dominion." — Hening,  iii.  298. 

z 


338   QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

was  asked,  in  the  critical  period  of  the  early  'sixties  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  to  become  a  member  of  the  Colonial 
Assembly.  At  first  he  declined  because  he  felt  that  such 
a  public  position  would  be  inconsistent  with  the  require 
ments  of  his  Quaker  faith.  As  the  storm  increased,  how 
ever,  and  the  colonial  crisis  plainly  grew  imminent,  he 
yielded,  and  in  1 764  went  as  member  from  his  county  to 
the  Virginia  House  of  Burgesses.  He  was  a  member 
when  Patrick  Henry  delivered  his  famous  speech  which 
heralded  independence,  and  he  remained  a  member  until 
the  colony  became  a  state.  He  was,  however,  eventually 
disowned  by  his  Meeting  for  his  complicity  with  warlike 
activities,  though  he  continued  until  the  end  of  his  life  to 
attend  Quaker  meetings. 

As  soon  as  we  turn  to  North  Carolina  we  are  in 
another  type  of  social  and  political  world.  Here  the 
only  organised  form  of  religion  which  existed  before  the 
eighteenth  century  was  that  of  the  Society  of  Friends. 
King  Charles  II.,  in  his  first  Charter  to  the  Proprietaries 
of  the  colony,  granted  in  1663,  gives  "full  and  free 
license  and  liberty  and  authority "  to  tolerate  all  persons 
in  the  colony  who,  "  in  their  judgment  and  for  conscience 
sake,  cannot  conform  to  the  liturgy  and  ceremonies  [of 
the  Church],  or  take  and  subscribe  the  oath."1  That 
same  year  [1663]  Sir  John  Colleton,  one  of  the  Proprietors, 
wrote  to  the  Duke  of  Albemarle,  another  Proprietor,  inform 
ing  him  the  Carolina  colony  can  be  "  planted  and  settled  " 
only  on  a  basis  of  "  liberty  of  conscience,"  without  that 
privilege,  he  declares,  "  settlers  will  not  goe." 2  The  result 
was  that  the  Proprietors  issued  in  August  1663  this 
"  declaration  and  proposal  to  all  that  will  plant  in 
Carolina  " : 

"  We  will  grant,  in  as  ample  manner  as  the  undertakers  shall 
desire,  freedom  and  liberty  of  conscience  in  all  religious  or 
spiritual  things,  and  to  be  kept  inviolably  with  them,  we  having 
power  in  our  charter  so  to  do."  * 

1  Colony  Records  of  North  Carolina,  i.  32. 

1  Ibid.  i.  34-35.  3  Ibid.  i.  45. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS   IN   PUBLIC  LIFE  339 

And    the    Fundamental    Constitution,    drafted    by    John 
Locke,  contained  this  enlightened  article  : 

"No  person  whatsoever  shall  disturb,  molest,  or  prosecute 
another,  for  his  speculative  opinions  in  religion,  or  his  way  of 
worship." l 

Here  then  was  an  "open  door"  for  the  Quaker  who 
desired  to  make  his  principles  prevail  in  the  affairs  of  the 
colony,  and  here,  too,  was  forming  throughout  the  last 
quarter  of  the  seventeenth  century  a  very  live  and 
aggressive  band  of  Quakers,  who  saw  themselves  for  once 
in  a  region  where  their  type  of  Christianity  had  no  rival. 
The  influence  of  Friends  in  the  colony  dates  from  the 
visits  of  Edmundson  and  Fox  in  1672.  The  Governor 
[Carteret]  and  his  wife  received  George  Fox  "  lovingly," 
and  accompanied  him  through  the  wilderness,  and  in  the 
home  of  Joseph  Scott,  a  deputy  in  the  Assembly,  the 
Quaker  missionaries  held  a  "  precious  meeting."  The 
"  chief  secretary  of  the  colony  "  was  already  a  convinced 
Friend  at  the  time  of  Fox's  visit,  having  been  reached 
apparently  by  Edmundson. 

"  For  three  weeks,"  writes  a  North  Carolina  historian,  "  Fox 
lingered  among  these  people  of  the  forest,  whom  he  described 
as  tender  and  loving  and  receptive  of  the  truth,  holding  meetings 
to  which  they  flocked.  The  seed  fell  on  good  ground.  The 
faith  of  the  zealous  evangelist,  who  appealed  so  effectively  to  the 
consciences  of  his  hearers,  took  firm  root  in  Albemarle.  No 
other  religious  meetings  were  held  calling  the  people  into 
communion,  and  at  once  ministering  to  their  human  needs, 
and  satisfying  their  spiritual  longings.  It  was  in  sympathy  with 
the  solitude  of  their  surroundings  and  the  quietude  of  their 
daily  life."  z 

Francis  Toms,  Christopher  Nicholson,  and  William 
Wyatt,  three  of  the  leading  men  of  the  colony — all  three  of 
whom  held  their  land  under  the  Great  Deed  of  the  Lord 
Proprietors — had  become  Quakers  by  the  year  1673,  and 
had  meetings  held  in  their  houses. 

1  Section  109,  Colony  Records,  i.  204. 

8  Ashe,  History  of  North  Carolina  (1908),  i.  109. 


340  QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

In  1677  the  colony  passed  through  a  mild  revolution, 
known  in  history  as  "  Culpepper's  Rebellion,"  undertaken 
and  carried  through  with  the  aim  of  securing  colonial  self- 
government — "  a  government  by  our  own  authority,  and 
according  to  our  own  model."1  One  of  the  foremost 
leaders  of  the  little  revolution  was  George  Durand,  who 
became  attorney-general  of  the  colony  in  1679.  The 
prevailing  opinion  among  those  who  have  described  this 
Rebellion  has  been  that  Durand  was  a  Quaker,  but  that 
seems  improbable.  Fox  never  mentions  him,  and  there  are 
no  contemporary  evidences  that  he  was  in  membership 
with  Friends.2  Friends  did  their  best  during  this  crisis 
to  keep  from  being  entangled  on  either  side  in  a  move 
ment  which  involved  bloodshed,  though  Timothy  Biggs, 
the  deputy  collector  of  customs — apparently  a  Quaker — 
was  unduly  aggressive  in  favour  of  the  status  quo,  even 
suggesting  to  the  Proprietors  that  a  ten-gun  vessel  would 
have  a  marked  influence  in  restoring  order !  The  official 
utterances  of  the  Society,  however,  declared  Friends  to  be 
"  a  separated  people,  standing  single  from  all  seditious 
actions,"  and  in  their  petition  to  the  Lords  Proprietors  in 
1679  they  ask  for  protection  from  "the  heads  of  the 
sedition  who  now  sit  in  Parliament,"  i.e.  in  the  colonial 
legislature.8 

John  Archdale  first  comes  into  connection  with  the 
Carolinas  by  the  purchase  of  Sir  John  Berkeley's  share  in 
the  proprietorship  of  the  colony  for  his  minor  son,  Thomas 
Archdale,  about  1680.  His  name  is  first  mentioned  in 
the  colonial  records  on  March  26,  1 68 1,  when  he  com 
missioned  Daniel  Akehurst — formerly  of  Virginia — to 
be  his  deputy.4  He  had,  however,  already  had  a  long 
apprenticeship  in  colonial  affairs,  having  served  from  1 664 
to  about  the  end  of  that  decade  as  agent  for  Sir  Ferdinando 
Gorges,  Governor  of  Maine.6  He  was  not  at  this  time  a 
Quaker,  but  became  one  soon  after  his  return  to  England, 

1  Colony  Records,  i.  228.  *  See  Weeks,  op.jcit.  pp.  33-34. 

1  Colony  Records,  i.  250-253. 
*  South  Carolina  Historical  Collection,  i.  104. 

8  The  National  Dictionary  of  Biography  makes  Archdale  brother-in-law  to 
Gorges. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS   IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  341 

probably  in  the  early  'seventies.1  He  seems  to  have  been 
reached  by  Fox  himself,  for  in  a  letter,  written  in  1686  to 
the  Quaker  founder,  he  says : 

"  I  desire  to  be  had  in  remembrance  by  thee,  having  faith  in 
the  power  that  was  by  thee,  in  this  last  age  of  the  world,  first 
preached,  and  [which]  convinced  me  ...  and  separated  me 
from  my  father's  house."  2 

Soon  after  he  became  a  Proprietor,  he  came  over  to 
America,  and  settled  in  the  colony — at  least  we  find  him 
there  in  the  winter  of  1683,  for  the  new  appointee  for 
Governor,  Seth  Sothel,  received  instructions  (dated 
December  14,  1683)  to  consult  with  John  Archdale  in 
making  his  official  appointments.  The  instructions  order 

"  That  he  doe  forwith,  with  the  advice  of  Mr.  Archdale,  choose 
four  of  the  discreatest  honest  men  of  the  county  who  were  no 
way  concerned  in  any  of  the  said  disturbances  to  be  Justices  of 
the  County  Court,  and  also  an  able  man  so  qualified  to  be  sherrif 
of  the  county,  that  there  may  bee  a  Court  of  impartiall  persons 
for  the  tryall  of  all  actions  that  have  relation  to  the  late  disorders 
that  those  injured  may  have  right  done  them  according  to  Law."  s 

During  a  part  of  the  years  1685  and  1686  Governor 
Sothel  was  out  of  the  colony,  and  John  Archdale 
temporarily  performed  the  duties  of  the  governorship, 
evidently  to  the  great  satisfaction  of  the  colonists.  It 
was  during  this  period  of  colonial  service  that  he  wrote 
the  letter  to  George  Fox,  already  referred  to.  He 
complains  in  the  letter  that  opportunities  for  intercourse 
between  the  colony  and  Great  Britain  are  meagre,  though 
the  colony  produces  many  exportable  commodities.  "  The 
country  produces  plentifully  all  things  necessary  for  the 
life  of  man,  with  as  little  labour  as  any  I  have  known. 
It  wants  only  industrious  people,  fearing  God."  He  gives 
an  interesting  account  of  the  way  he  has  dealt  with  the 
Indians,  and  brought  them  into  peaceful  conditions — "  I 

1  Isaac  Milles,  who  was  vicar  of  Chipping  Wycombe  parish  from  1674  to  1681, 
expresses  his  regret  that  John  Archdale  has  turned  Quaker,  because  "  he  is  the 
chief  gentleman  of  the  village. " 

8  Letter  in  Bowden,  i.  416. 

8  Colony  Records,  i.  346.  There  are,  too,  other  orders  to  consult  John 
Archdale.  See  especially  Colony  Records,  i.  346,  350,  and  351. 


342   QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

look  upon  their  outward  civilising,"  he  says,  "  as  a  good 
preparation  for  the  Gospel,  which  God  in  his  season, 
without  doubt,  will  cause  to  dawn  among  them."  He  is 
impressed  with  the  spread  of  the  Quaker  faith,  which, 
undoubtedly,  his  presence  in  the  colony  had  done  much 
to  advance,  but  his  reference  to  it  is  in  these  simple, 
unostentatious  words :  "  The  growth  of  the  Divine  Seed 
in  these  parts  is  an  encouragement  to  all  that  witness  it." 1 
He  apparently  returned  to  England  sometime  during 
the  year  1686  ;  to  come  back  a  decade  later  with  greatly 
enlarged  powers.  Between  the  years  1686  and  1695 — 
i.e.  the  period  of  Archdale's  absence  in  England — the 
affairs  of  the  colony  were  in  a  troublous  condition.  Sothel 
became  impossible  either  as  Governor  or  Proprietor,  and 
was  forced  out  of  the  country,  but  none  of  the  men  who 
tried  to  direct  affairs  was  possessed  of  wisdom  or  prestige 
enough  to  quiet  the  disturbances,  or  to  settle  the  issues 
which  were  embroiling  the  different  sections  of  the  great 
colony.2  The  Proprietors  were  finally  aroused  to  the 
urgency  of  the  situation  by  a  letter  from  Governor  Smith, 
who  was  vainly  trying  to  bring  the  colony  into  order, 
calling  upon  the  Proprietors  to  send  over  one  of  their 
number.3  The  colonists  suggested  that  Lord  Ashley  was 
the  "  proper  person  for  such  a  worke,"  but  "  his  circum 
stances  would  not  admitt  of  his  absence  from  England, 
though  his  heart  and  affections  were  intirely  inclined 
hither."  It  was  then  that  Archdale  was  summoned  to 
the  task.  To  quote  his  own  words :  "  Ye  Proprietors 
were  pleased  to  look  upon  mee  as  one  that  would  be 
impartiall  in  examining  into  ye  causes  [of  discontent], 
and  thereby  bee  ye  more  capable  of  judging  equally  ye 
parties  concerned  in  ye  differences " ;  and  furthermore 

1  Bowden,  i.  415-416. 

8  Carolina  was  divided  into  the  North  and  South  Colonies  about  1688,  though 
still  under  one  proprietorship. 

*  In  his  opening  speech  to  the  Assembly  in  South  Carolina  Archdale  said : 
' '  The  occasion  of  my  coming  hither  was  .  .  .  that  there  came  various  letters 
from  Carolina,  signifying  ye  great  discontent  and  division  ye  people  were  under, 
but  especially  one  .  .  .  wherein  it  was  signified  that  ye  heates  and  animosities 
amongst  you  was  growne  almost  irreconcileable,  and  that,  except  a  proprietor  did 
speedily  come  over,  there  was  no  hopes  of  any  reconciliation  amongst  you." 
This  address  is  printed  in  full  in  Historical  Collection  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  102. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS   IN   PUBLIC  LIFE  343 

his    appointment    had    "  the    encouragement    of    several 
Carolinians  then  in  England."  l 

The  official  appointment  of  Archdale  was  made  by 
Lord  Craven,  Palatine 2  of  the  Carolinas,  and  was  as 
follows : 

"  WILLIAM,  EARLE  OF  CRAVEN,  VISCOUNT  CRAVEN  OF 
UFFINGTON,  BARON  CRAVEN  OF  HAMPSTEAD,  MARSHALL 
PALATINE 

"  To  JOHN  ARCHDALE,  Esqr. 
one  of  the  Landgraves  and 
Governour  of  Carolina. 

"Whereas  it  is  agreed  by  ye  Lords  Proprietors  of  ye  said 
Province  that  the  Palatine  should  name  ye  Governour,  I  out  of 
the  Trust  and  confidence  I  have  in  ye  Wisdom,  Prudence, 
Integrity  and  Loyalty  of  you  John  Archdale,  Esqr.,  Doe  hereby 
nominate,  Constitute  and  Appoint  you  ye  sd.  John  Archdale  to 
be  Governour  and  Commander-in-Chief  of  Carolina,  with  full 
power  and  authority  to  doe  Act  and  Execute  all  such  Jurisdic 
tions  and  Powers  as  by  virtue  of  ye  Rules  of  Government  and 
Instructions  given  by  myself  and  ye  rest  of  ye  Lords  Proprietors 
of  ye  sd.  Province  a  Governour  is  to  doe  and  Exercize.  And  you 
are  to  follow  such  instructions  as  are  herewith  given  you  or  that 
you  shall  hereafter  from  time  to  time  receive  from  myself  and 
ye  rest  of  ye  Lords  Proprietors  of  ye  said  Province  and  thus  to 
continue  during  my  Pleasure.  Given  under  my  hand  and  Scale 
this  z8th  day  of  November  1694. 

"CRAVEN,  Palatine."3 

This  document  is,  however,  only  the  official  certificate  of 
his  appointment,  for  the  Proprietors  had  already, on  the  3  ist 
of  August  of  the  same  year,  "  constituted  and  appointed  " 
"  our  trusty  and  well  -  beloved  John  Archdale,  Esqr., 
Governour  of  our  whole  province  of  Carolina,  reposing 
special  trust  in  ye  courage,  loyalty,  and  prudence  of  ye 
sd.  John  Archdale."  They  had  given  him  very  large  and 
comprehensive  power  : 

1  From  Archdale's  Speech  in  the  South  Carolina  Assembly. 

8  The  Palatine  was  the  highest  order  of  nobility  in  Locke's  Constitution  for  the 
Colony. 

8  From  the  Archdale  Papers  in  the  Roberts  Collection  at  Haverford  College. 
I  find  from  the  British  State  Paper  Office  for  October  17,  1694,  the  Governor's 
salary  was  ^200  per  annum. 


344  QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

"Wee  do  hereby  further  Impower,  constitute  and  apoint 
you  our  sd.  Governour  to  be  Admirall,  Capt.  Generall  and 
Commander-in-chief  of  all  ye  forces  raised  or  to  be  raised  both 
by  sea  and  land  within  our  sd.  Province  and  over  them  to 
appoint  a  Lieutenant  General,  or  Lieutenant  Generals,  Vice 
Admirall  or  Vice  Admiralls  both  of  South  and  North  Carolina  " 

with    further  extensive  power  of  appointment  and   with 
far-reaching  authority  over  internal  affairs.1 

The  new  governor  sailed  almost  immediately  upon  his 
appointment,  landed  in  New  England,  visited  Boston, 
Plymouth,  Rhode  Island,  and  travelled  by  land  to  his 
province,  arriving  in  North  Carolina  June  25,  1695. 
His  daughter,  who  was  married  to  Emanuel  Lowe, 
resided  in  Albemarle,  and  here,  among  his  own  people, 
organising  the  troubled  affairs  of  the  northern  colony  and 
adding  new  life  and  power  to  the  Quaker  meetings  along 
the  Sound,  he  remained  about  six  weeks.  On  his  arrival 
he  had  found  Thomas  Harvey — probably  a  Quaker — 
acting  as  deputy  governor,  and  when  he  departed  to  go 
to  the  Southern  Colony,  he  left  Harvey  in  charge  of  the 
administration  in  North  Carolina.2  Archdale  arrived  in 
Charleston,  South  Carolina,  early  in  August,  and  set  him 
self  to  work  to  get  at  the  seat  of  the  colonial  troubles. 
In  his  own  account  he  says  : 

"When  I  arrived  I  found  all  matters  in  great  confusion  and 
every  faction  apply'd  themselves  to  me  in  hopes  of  relief.  I 
appeased  them  with  kind  and  gentle  words  and  as  soon  as 
possible  called  an  assembly."8 

There  was  much  hard  feeling  and  jealousy  between 
dissenters  and  churchmen,  and  between  moderate  church- 

1  These  instructions  are  in  the  British  State  Papers  Office  for  North  Carolina, 
and  are  printed  in  Colony  Records  of  North  Carolina,  i.  389-390. 

2  When   Thomas  Story  came  to  North  Carolina  in  1699  he  had  letters  to 
Thomas  Harvey  who  received  him  and  entertained  him  (Journal,  p.  157),  and  it 
appears  further  that  Harvey  did  not  take  an  oath  as  Governor,  since  Governor 
Nicholson  of  Virginia  refused  to  recognise  his  authority  to  appoint  commissioners 
to  settle  the  boundary  between  North  Carolina  and  Virginia  on  the  ground  that 
the  Governor  was  not  under  oath  in  office  (Ashe,  i.  150).     Daniel  Akehurst,  a 
Quaker,  was  at  this  time  Secretary  of  the  Colony,  and  Francis  Toms  was  an 
assistant.     See  Colony  Records,  i.  413. 

*  Archdale's  "  Description  of  Carolina, "  written  in  1707,  printed  in  Historical 
Collection  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  85-120.] 


CH.  in  QUAKERS  IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  345 

men  and  high  churchmen,  and  in  forming  his  Council 
Archdale  endeavoured  to  "  mix "  his  forces.  He  gives 
this  quaint  account  of  his  plan  : 

"Although  my  power  was  very  large,  yet  I  did  not  wholly 
exclude  the  High-Church  party  out  of  the  essential  part  of  the 
government,  but  mixed  two  moderate  church-men  to  one  High 
Church  man  in  the  Council  whereby  the  Balance  of  Government 
was  preserved  peaceable  and  quiet  in  my  time."  x 

The  choice  of  the  Assembly  was  left  with  the  people, 
and  it  met  for  official  business  August  17,  1695.  The 
Governor  was  not  required  to  take  an  oath,  but  gave 
affirmation  to  the  following  engagement : 

"Alt  a  Councill  Held  at  Charles  Towne  the  i?th  day  of 
August  Anno  Domi.  1698:  And  Psent  the  Rt.  Honoble.  John 
Archdale  Esqr.,  Governor. 

PAUL  GRIMBALL. 
STEPHEN:  BULL. 

Dep1?8.  RICHARD  :  CONANT.     Esqrs. 
WILLIAM  :  SMITH. 
WILLIAM  HAWETT. 

This  day  the  Rl.  Honoble.  John  Archdale  Esqr.,  Governor,  in 
open  Councill  Tooke  the  following  oaths  or  declarations  accord 
ing  to  the  forme  of  his  profession. 

You  being  Governor  doe  solemnely  promise  and  Ingage  that 
you  will  govern  according  to  the  Lords  Proprs.  Instructions  and 
Rules  of  Government  and  as  the  Law  Directs  :  you  will  Dis 
tribute  equall  Justice  without  delay  to  the  Rich  and  poore :  The 
Secretts  of  the  Council  you  will  keep,  In  all  things  you  shall 
endeavour  to  discharge  the  Trust  reposed  in  you  on  behalfe  of 
the  Lords  for  the  good  of  the  people  according  to  your  power 
and  the  best  of  your  understanding.  This  you  declare  according 
to  the  forme  of  your  profession. 

You  shall  well  and  truely  to  the  best  of  yor  Skill,  use  your 
utmost  endeavour  to  cause  the  severall  Clauses  contained  in  the 
Acts  of  Parliament  Called  an  Act  for  the  Encouraging  and 
Increasing  of  Shipping  &  navigation,  passed  or  made  in  the 
twelfth  yeare  of  the  Reigne  of  our  Late  Soveraigne  Lord  King 
Charles  the  Second;  And  the  Acte  of  Parliament  Called  an 
Act  for  the  Encouradgement  of  Trade,  passed  or  made  in  the 

1  Historical  Collection  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  113. 


346  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

fifteenth  yeare  of  our  saide  Late  Soveraigne  Lord  King  Charles 
the  Second.  This  you  declare  according  to  the  forme  of  your 
profession. 

I  doe  solemnely  promise  to  beare  faith  and  true  allegiance 
To  King  William. 

A  True  Coppy  taken  from  the  Records  and 
examined  this  iyth  day  of  August  1695, 
P.  Jno.,  Deptv.  Secty." l 

He,  thereupon,  addressed  the  Assembly  explaining 
why  he  had  been  "endued  with  such  considerable  power 
of  trust,"  and  promising  "  faithfully  and  impartially "  to 
"  answer  their  expectations."  "  And  I  appeal,"  he  says, 
"  to  that  of  God  in  your  consciences."  "  I  shall  endeavor 
to  heale  all  ye  differences  amongst  you,  to  reconcile  all 
persons."  "  I  hope  you  will  heartily  joine  to  carry  on 
ye  public  good,"  and  "  by  ye  good  settlement  of  this 
hopefull  colony,  posterity  will  have  cause  to  blesse  God." 
Finally  he  urged  speedy  action  toward  the  reasonable 
and  honorable  ordering  of  all  things  because  of  the  un 
certainty  of  life — "  my  own  mortality  and  that  of  others  " 
— "  I  hope  these  considerations  will  quicken  you." 2 

Archdale's  expectations  were  more  than  fulfilled.  He 
proved  to  be,  not  a  crude  compromiser,  but  a  genuine 
pacifier,  because  he  possessed,  in  an  extraordinary  measure, 
the  genius  for  putting  his  finger  on  cardinal  issues,  and 
for  penetrating  through  the  husks  of  controversy  to  the 
inner  core  of  righteousness.  When  he  proposed  his  solu 
tion  of  an  issue,  it  generally  satisfied  all  parties  concerned, 
because  it  was  seen  to  be  wise  and  fair. 

In  their  humble  address  to  the  governor  at  his  leave- 
taking,  "  the  commons "  expressed  their  thanks  for  his 
"  prudent,  industrious  and  indefatigable  care  and  manage 
ment."  They  declared  that  he  had  "  worked  for  the 

1  From  the  Archdale  Papers  in  the  Roberts  Collection.     The  following  amusing 
account  of  Archdale's  scruples  appears  in  the  Report  of  William  Gordon,  repre 
sentative  in  North  Carolina  "  of  the  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel." 
' '  Mr.  Archdale  uncovered  his  head  to  hear  a  foolish  woman  make  an  unaccount 
able  clamour  before  meat,  at  his  own  table,  but  when  he  subscribed  the  oath 
[affirmation]  to  be  taken  for  putting  in  execution  the  laws  of  trade  he  did  it  with 
his  hat  on,  which  is  an  error  no  Barclay  has  made  an  '  apology '  for  I " — Colony 
Records,  i.  708. 

2  Address  to  the  Assembly. 


CH.  m  QUAKERS   IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  347 

peace,  welfare,  tranquility,  plenty,  prosperity,  and  safety 
of  the  colony,"  and  they  assure  him  that  he  has  "  removed 
all  former  doubts,  jealousies,  and  discouragements  of  us 
the  people." l 

Archdale  had  four  main  problems  to  solve:  (i)  To 
establish  harmony  and  peace  among  the  colonists  them 
selves  ;  (2)  To  reconcile  them  to  the  jurisdiction  and 
authority  of  the  Proprietors  ;  (3)  To  establish  a  colonial 
policy  toward  the  Indians,  and  to  regulate  traffic  with 
them ;  (4)  To  secure  an  amicable  basis  of  relationship 
between  the  English  colonists  and  the  Huguenot  refugees 
who  were  being  discriminated  against.  In  the  first  two 
matters,  he  was,  for  the  time  being,  entirely  successful — 
"  he  has  removed  all  former  doubts,  jealousies,  and  dis 
couragements." 

He  was  peculiarly  qualified  to  succeed  with  the 
Indians,  and  he  is  one  of  the  finest  embodiments  of 
the  Quaker  attitude  toward  these  native  peoples.  He 
insisted  that  Indians  should  be  treated  as  persons,  and 
should  be  protected  in  their  elemental  rights.  One  of 
the  first  Bills  which  he  drafted  was  an  Act  to  prevent 
debauching  Indians.  It  reads  : 

"It  is  enacted. that  every  person  which  shall  give,  or  any 
other  way  dispose  of  any  rum  or  brandy,  or  any  sorte  of  spirrits 
to  any  Indian  or  Indians  .  .  .  shall  forfeit  for  every  time  he 
shall  dispose  of  any  such  liquors  as  aforesaid  the  summe  of 
twenty  pounds."  z 

He  himself  has  left  a  very  happy  illustration  of  the 
effect  of  a  kindly  policy  toward  the  natives.  He  says 
that  during  his  administration  he  made  a  treaty  of 
friendship  with  a  coast  tribe  of  Indians.  Not  long  after, 
a  company  of  adventurous  immigrants  from  New  England 
were  shipwrecked  on  the  same  coast,  and,  finding  them 
selves  surrounded  by  Indians,  expected  to  be  murdered. 
They  entrenched  themselves  as  well  as  they  could,  and 
prepared  to  defend  their  lives.  The  Indians  tried  in 
every  way  to  declare  their  attitude  of  friendship,  but  the 

1  Historical  Collection  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  104. 

2  Statutes  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  109. 


348  QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

stranded  immigrants  would  not  trust  them,  until  they 
were  forced,  by  the  exhaustion  of  their  provisions,  to 
throw  themselves  on  the  mercy  of  the  Red  men.  These 
received  them  with  great  civility,  furnished  them  with 
provisions,  and  helped  them  to  send  a  delegation  to 
Charleston  for  relief.1 

His  attempts  to  settle  the  Huguenot  difficulties  were 
less  successful,  though  the  solution  was  in  sight  before  he 
left  the  colony.  The  crux  of  the  difficulty  was  that  the 
English  settlers  refused  to  allow  the  French — French- 
English  animosity  being  then  very  quick  and  keen — to 
sit  in  the  Assembly  or  to  vote  for  its  members.  Archdale 
found  that  he  could  not  grant  the  French  these  privileges 
of  citizenship  without  losing  the  goodwill  of  the  English 
colonists,  and  he  yielded  for  the  moment.  But  he  urged 
the  English  to  treat  their  alien  neighbours  in  the  spirit  of 
friendship,  and  to  temper  all  their  dealings  with  them 
with  "  levity  and  moderation."  He  carried  on  a  friendly 
correspondence  with  the  Huguenots,  and  he  prepared  the 
way  for  their  complete  naturalisation.  A  letter  from  the 
Proprietors  to  him  says  that  they  are  glad  to  hear  that 
the  Assembly  is  inclined  to  grant  naturalisation  to  the 
French ; 2  and  soon  after  his  return  an  Act  was  passed, 
which  provided  that  "all  aliens  of  what  nation  soever, 
which  now  are  inhabitants  of  South  Carolina  shall  have 
all  rights,  privileges,  and  immunities  which  any  person 
born  of  English  parents  within  this  province  has." 8 

He  oversaw  the  construction  of  improved  public  roads. 
He  prepared  the  first  Act  on  record  in  South  Carolina 
for  the  regulation  of  the  liquor  traffic,4  and  he  also 
prepared  a  beneficent  measure  for  the  administration  of 
charity,  and  for  the  care  and  relief  of  the  poor.6  Many 
complications  had  arisen  over  the  inadequate  methods 
of  "  granting "  lands  and  of  collecting  quit-rents.  He 
brought  about  a  readjustment  of  methods,  which  greatly 
relieved  the  old  settlers,  and  which  encouraged  new 

1  Historical  Collection  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  108. 

2  In  British  State  Paper  Office  under  date  of  September  10,  1696. 
8  Statutes  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  131. 

4  Ibid.  ii.  113.  6  Ibid.  ii.  116. 


CH.  in  QUAKERS  IN  PUBLIC  LIFE  349 

immigrants  to  come  in.  He  worked  out  a  plan  for 
protecting  the  colonists  round  Cape  Fear  against  kid 
nappers,  and  he  insisted  on  kindness  toward  mariners 
who  were  shipwrecked  on  the  coast.  He  was  so  far 
tolerant  of  other  faiths  than  his  own  that  he  took  up 
friendly  relations  with  the  Catholic  Spaniards  of  Florida. 
Four  Indians,  converts  of  the  Spanish  priests,  were 
captured  by  Carolina  Indians  and  exposed  for  sale  as 
slaves.  Archdale  ransomed  them  and  sent  them  to  the 
Spanish  Governor  at  St.  Augustine.  "  I  shall  manifest 
reciprocal  kindness,"  wrote  the  Spaniard,  and  he  was 
true  to  his  promise.1  Settlers  from  New  England  were 
attracted  to  this  "  American  Canaan,"  as  Archdale  calls  it, 
and  they  recognised  that  the  Southern  colony  now  "  stood 
circumstanced  with  the  honour  of  a  true  English  govern 
ment,  zealous  for  the  increase  of  virtue,  as  well  as  outward 
trade  and  business." 2 

When  the  Quaker  Governor  had  finished  his  term  of 
service  and  was  returning  to  England,  the  representatives 
of  the  freemen  of  the  colony  expressed  to  him  their 
profound  appreciation  of  his  great  work  among  them, 
and  declared,  "  By  your  wisdom,  patience,  and  labor  you 
have  laid  a  firm  foundation  for  a  most  glorious  super 
structure."  3 

One  of  the  most  immediate  after-fruits  of  his  sojourn 
was  the  passage  of  an  Act,  March  10,  1697,  which  granted 
liberty  of  conscience  to  all  colonists — "  except  only 
papists " — "  All  Christians  which  now  are  or  hereafter 
may  be  in  this  province  shall  enjoy  the  full  liberty  of 
their  conscience."4  Archdale  himself  did  not  receive 
such  broad  and  enlightened  treatment.  Soon  after  his 
return  to  England  he  was  elected  to  Parliament  as 
member  from  the  borough  of  Chipping  Wycombe,  but 
being  unable,  for  conscientious  reasons,  to  take  the  oath, 
he  was  refused  his  seat. 

Before     sailing    from     America    he    revisited    North 


1  Historical  Collection  of  South  Carolina,  i.  120. 

3  Letter  preserved  in  Historical  Collection  of  South  Carolina,  ii.  105. 

*  Ibid.  ii.   104.  4  Statutes  of  South  Carolina,  ii. 


133- 


350  QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  m 

Carolina,  and  travelled  through  the  province  with  James 
Dickinson  who  was  there  on  a  religious  visit.1  He 
reconfirmed  the  appointment  of  Thomas  Harvey  as 
governor  of  the  northern  colony,  and  so  far  won  the 
regard  and  confidence  of  the  colonists  that  they  wrote 
officially  to  the  Proprietors  of  him  :  "  It  was  his  greatest 
care  to  make  peace  and  plenty  flow  amongst  us." 2 

This  "  American  Canaan,"  however,  was  not  long  to 
remain  in  "peace."  In  1700,  the  first  minister  of  the 
Church  of  England  arrived  in  Albemarle,  and  from  that 
time  on,  a  strong  party  formed  in  the  colony  determined 
to  make  life  difficult  for  all  who  would  not  "  conform."  An 
act  was  passed  in  1701  which  practically  established  the 
Church  in  the  colony.  The  dissenters — who  were  mainly 
Quakers — rallied  themselves  at  the  next  election,  and 
got  control  of  the  Assembly.  Governor  Walker — who 
succeeded  Harvey — and  who  was  determined  to  make 
North  Carolina  a  Church  of  England  colony,  wrote  to 
the  Bishop  of  London  in  October  1703  : 

"I  beg  leave  to  inform  you  that  we  have  an  Assembly  to  sit 
on  the  3rd  of  November  next ;  above  one-half  of  the  Burgesses 
chosen  are  Quakers,  and  have  declared  their  designs  of  making 
void  the  Act  for  establishing  the  Church."  3 

The  Act  was,  however,  annulled  by  the  Proprietors  them 
selves,  but  the  issue  was  still  very  much  alive. 

In  1704  Rev.  John  Blair  came  to  the  colony  as  the 
first  representative  of  the  "  Society  for  the  Propagation  of 
the  Gospel  in  Foreign  Parts."  He  found  the  Quakers 
"  the  most  powerful  enemies  to  Church  government,"  and 
he  found  in  the  colony  a  large  number  of  persons  who 
would  have  been  Quakers  "  if  the  demand  for  purity  of 
life  had  not  been  too  great  for  them."  4 

The  report  of  William  Gordon  (made  in  1709),  plainly 
shows  that  the  Quaker  influence  in  politics  at  the  beginning 
of  the  century  was  very  great.  He  says  : 

1  Friends  Library,  xii.  396. 

9  John  Archdale's  will,  dated  1713,  is  preserved  in  Portfolio  14,  Devonshire 
House. 

*  Colony  Records,  \.  572.  *  Ibid.  \.  600 


CH.  in  QUAKERS  IN   PUBLIC  LIFE  351 

"  They  [the  Quakers]  were  made  councillors  and  grew  powerful, 
for  the  council  granting  commissions,  in  a  short  time  they  had 
Quaker  members  in  most  of  their  courts  ;  nay  in  some  the 
majority  was  such.  They  were  very  dilligent  at  the  election  of 
members  of  the  Assembly,  so  that  what  by  themselves,  the 
assistance  of  several  unthinking  people  and  the  carelessness  of 
others,  they  carried  it  so  far  that  no  encouragement  could  be 
obtained  for  ministers  [of  the  Church]." l 

This  Report  of  William  Gordon,  though  full  of  pre 
judice  and  hostility  to  the  Quakers,  gives  some  light  on 
their  numbers  in  North  Carolina.  He  says  : 

"As  to  their  number,  they  are  at  this  time  but  about  the 
tenth  part  of  the  inhabitants;  and  if  they  were  more,  they 
would  be  but  the  greater  burden,  since  they  contribute  nothing 
towards  its  defence."  .  .  .  "The  Quakers  in  the  precinct  of 
Perquimans  are  very  numerous,  extremely  ignorant,  insufferably 
proud  and  ambitious,  and  consequently  ungovernable."  ..."  The 
next  precinct  is  Pasquotank,  where  as  yet  there  is  no  Church  built ; 
the  Quakers  are  here  very  numerous ;  the  roads  are,  I  think, 
the  worst ;  but  it  is  closer  settled  than  the  others,  and  better 
peopled  in  proportion  to  its  bigness.  In  their  way  of  living  they 
have  much  the  advantage  of  the  rest,  being  more  industrious, 
careful  and  cleanly."2 

In  1 704  South  Carolina  passed  an  act  "  for  the 
establishment  of  worship  according  to  the  Church  of 
England"  and  the  "Vestry  Act"  of  North  Carolina, 
which  was  passed  soon  after,  appears  to  have  virtually 
disfranchised  all  dissenters  in  that  colony.3  Edmund 
Porter,  a  representative  Friend,  was  sent  to  England  to 
present  the  complaints  of  the  dissenters  and  to  secure 
relief,  and  the  old  governor,  John  Archdale,  soon  after, 
wrote  his  "  Description  of  Carolina  "  to  express  his  protest 
against  the  attempted  limitation  of  religious  freedom  in 
the  two  colonies. 

Troubles,  however,  increased.  By  an  Act  of  Parlia 
ment  (1704)  all  persons  holding  public  office  were  required 
to  take  an  oath  of  allegiance  to  the  new  Queen,  Anne. 
The  oath  was  administered  by  Governor  Daniel  to  the 

1  Gordon's  Report,  Colony  Records,  i.  708-715. 

2  Colony- Records,  pp.  708-715. 

*  Act  is  described  in  Gordon's  Report,  Colony  Records,  i.  708-715. 


352   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES  BK.  m 

Quakers  in  the  Council  and  Assembly  of  North  Carolina, 
and,  on  their  refusal  to  take  it,  they  were  thrown  out  of 
office,  and  also  dismissed  from  all  courts  of  justice.  Porter, 
the  Quaker  "  ambassador  "  from  the  colony,  seems  to  have 
succeeded  in  his  mission  to  the  extent  of  securing  a 
change  of  governors.  Thomas  Cary,  supposed  to  be  in 
sympathy  with  dissenters,  and  himself  a  son-in-law  of 
Archdale,  was  selected  for  the  new  governor.  He  proved, 
however,  to  be  a  hollow  reed,  for  he,  too,  administered 
the  oath,  which  again  cleared  the  Assembly  of  Quakers, 
and  a  fine  was  imposed  on  any  person  who  should  act 
officially  without  taking  the  oath.  This  time,  John 
Porter,  a  man  of  great  determination  and  large  influence, 
was  sent  to  England  as  the  agent  of  the  colony  to  secure 
relief  from  these  new  grievances.  Such  matters  moved 
slowly  in  those  days,  and  Porter  needed  patience,  but  he 
finally,  in  1707,  secured  a  suspension  of  the  laws  imposing 
oaths,  and  also  an  order  suspending  Cary  as  governor.1 
John  Porter,  on  his  return,  with  consummate  political 
skill,  won  over  Cary  to  the  dissenters'  side,  and  got  him 
chosen  president  of  the  Council,  and  so  ex-officio  governor. 
The  Quaker  party  was  now  a  prominent  influence  in  the 
control  of  affairs.  A  strong  reaction  against  the  Cary 
government  set  in,  and  in  1710  Edward  Hyde  was  selected 
by  the  Proprietors  to  be  governor  of  North  Carolina.  He 
decided  to  force  the  Quakers  out  of  the  Council  and  the 
Assembly,  and  Gary's  government  was  declared  a  "  usurpa 
tion."  Cary  and  John  Porter  were  seized  but  escaped, 
and  a  tiny  "  rebellion  "  followed  in  which  one  man  was 
killed.  The  real  issue  was  the  principle  of  religious 
liberty,  but  the  Quakers  were  not  active  in  the  rebellion, 
and  did  not  sympathise  with  the  methods  adopted  by 
Cary  and  Porter,  however  much  they  were  consecrated  in 
spirit  to  the  principle  at  issue.2  But,  though  the  Quakers 

1  Colony  Records,  i.  709. 

a  Cary  was,  as  said  above,  a  son-in-law  of  Archdale,  but  he  was  apparently 
not  a  "  member  of  meeting,"  nor  probably  was  John  Porter.  Emanuel  Lowe, 
however,  another  son-in-law  of  Archdale,  and  an  active  participant  in  the 
"  rebellion,"  was  a  "member."  He  was  "dealt  with"  by  the  Yearly  Meeting 
for  "having  acted  divers  things  contrary  to  our  ways  and  practices."  See 
Southern  Quakerism  and  Slavery,  p.  166. 


CH.III  QUAKERS  IN  PUBLIC   LIFE  353 

were  not  directly  responsible  for  the  fiasco,  it  ended  un 
favourably  for  them.  It  marked  the  end  of  their  political 
influence.  One  Quaker,  William  Borden,  was  elected  a 
member  of  the  Assembly  from  Carteret  County  in  1747, 
and  presented  himself  to  take  "  affirmation,"  but  the 
affirmation  was  denied  him,  and  a  new  election  for  his 
successor  was  ordered.1  Henceforth,  during  the  colonial 
period,  Quakerism  was  a  quiet  spiritual  force,  apart  from 
public  affairs,  and  concerned  with  the  formation  of  an 
inward  life  and  the  creation  of  a  peculiar  people. 

1  Colony  Records,  iv.  885-887. 


2  A 


BOOK    IV 

THE   EARLY  QUAKERS  IN   NEW  JERSEY 
BY  AMELIA   M.   GUMMERE 


355 


CHAPTER    I 

THE   SETTLEMENT   OF   THE   JERSEYS 

"  My  friends,  that  are  gone  or  are  going  over  to  plant  and  make  outward 
plantations  in  America,  keep  your  own  plantations  in  your  hearts  with  the 
spirit  and  power  of  God,  that  your  own  vines  and  lilies  be  not  hurt." — GEORGE 
FOX,  Epistles. 

THE  causes  of  Quaker  emigration  to  the  American 
colonies  are  not  so  much  to  be  sought  in  the  desire  to 
escape  from  persecution,  as  in  the  idea  which  took  shape 
in  the  mind  of  William  Penn,  to  show  Quakerism  at 
work,  freed  from  hampering  conditions.  Here,  too,  may 
be  seen  the  guiding  hand  of  the  founder  himself.  Ten 
years  before  the  "  Holy  Experiment "  was  tried  in 
Pennsylvania,  George  Fox  and  his  companions — several 
of  whom  were  men  of  the  true  pioneer  spirit — traversed 
that  part  of  the  colonial  wilderness  destined  to  be  the 
Quakers'  refuge  from  the  increasing  storm  of  persecution 
which  followed  the  Restoration.  The  latter  was  doubtless 
a  contributing  cause,  but  the  impulse  to  emigrate  came 
as  much  from  within  the  sect  itself,  as  from  the  outside 
pressure  of  circumstances.  The  idea  was  not  a  new  one. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  effort  in  the  direction  of  Quaker 
settlements  in  the  middle  colonies  of  America  was  made 
nearly  twenty-five  years  before  William  Penn  came  to 
Pennsylvania.  The  coast  from  Maine  to  Florida  being 
already  apparently  in  possession  of  other  adherents  of  the 
King,  the  Quakers  turned  their  first  attention  inland  with 
a  proposal  which  came  to  naught,  but  which  has  escaped 
the  attention  of  most  historians  except  Bowden. 

Josiah  Coale,   an    interesting   Gloucestershire    Friend, 

357 


358    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

visited  America  within  a  year  after  the  three  pioneer 
women,  Elizabeth  Harris,  Mary  Fisher,  and  Ann  Austin, 
and  appears  to  have  penetrated  farther  west  among 
the  Indians  of  the  interior  than  any  one  else.  His 
second  visit  in  1660  was  under  commission  from  the 
English  Friends  to  treat  with  the  Indians  of  the 
Susquehanna  for  the  purchase  of  lands.1  The  absence  of 
an  influential  arbitrator  familiar  with  savage  customs,  as 
well  as  the  violence  of  the  tribal  wars  then  being  waged, 
prevented  further  steps  being  taken  at  that  time  by  Josiah 
Coale,  who  returned  home  without  having  accomplished 
his  purpose.  The  liquid  syllables  of  the  Susquehanna 
long  had  an  alluring  sound  to  English  ears,  for  one 
is  reminded  of  the  "  Pantisocracy "  of  a  century  later, 
when  the  same  region  for  a  time  offered  a  refuge  for 
bruised  literary  and  democratic  hearts  after  the  French 
Revolution,  until  that  too  proved  vain,  and  Wordsworth's 
sonnet  to  the  "  Degenerate  Sons "  of  Pennsylvania 
expressed  his  chagrin  when  his  financial  speculations  fell 
out. 

So  early  as  1630  the  white  man  was  in  New  Jersey, 
called,  according  to  Indian  tradition,  "  Scheyichbi."  The 
"New  Albion"  settlement  of  Sir  Edward  Plowden,  the  Irish 
nobleman,  and  the  Dutch  occupancy  of  the  lower  Delaware 
in  1632,  together  with  the  Swedish  undertaking  at  the 
instance  of  Gustavus  Adolphus  carried  out  in  1637,  were 
followed  by  several  companies  of  settlers,  who,  after  the 
complete  destruction  of  more  than  one  village  and  fort, 
succeeded  in  establishing  themselves  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  the  Dutch  and  Swedes  near  New  Castle,  and  on  the 
Jersey  side  of  Delaware  Bay.  Before  1663  an  occasional 
Puritan,  Baptist,  or  Quaker  appears  to  have  drifted  over 
from  the  New  England  colonies  in  search  of  a  less 
restricted  religious  atmosphere,  and  to  have  found  the 
tolerant  Dutchman  a  congenial  companion.  In  this  year 
a  group  of  New  Englanders  settled  on  the  Raritan  river, 
and  soon  there  were  villages  at  Piscataway,  Woodbridge, 
and  Newark,  the  latter  under  the  spiritual  guidance  of 

1  Coale's  Letter  is  in  the  A.  R.  Barclay  Collection,  No.  53  (1661). 


CH.I         SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS        359 

Abraham  Pierson,  who  with  his  followers  in  1666  had 
rebelled  at  the  prospect  of  annexation  to  Massachusetts, 
and  had  left  New  Haven  and  the  theocratic  rule  of  the 
"  Saints,"  to  found  a  home  in  a  more  democratic 
community.  A  few  New  England  names  still  survive 
among  the  descendants  of  Quakers  who,  in  this  early 
period,  came  from  Massachusetts  to  New  Jersey,  where 
the  meeting  at  Shrewsbury  grew  to  great  importance. 
Before  1675,  the  enormous  tract  of  intervening  country 
between  these  settlers  and  those  on  the  lower  Delaware 
formed  a  great  wilderness,  untrodden  by  white  man, 
except  the  occasional  trader,  who  followed  the  Indian 
trail  leading  from  "Achter  Koll"  (Back  Bay)  now 
Newark  Bay,  to  the  Delaware  at  the  Falls.  This  was 
the  "Upper  Road."  The  "Lower  Road"  branched  off 
five  or  six  miles  from  the  Raritan  river,  made  a  sweep  to 
the  east,  and  struck  the  Delaware  at  what  is  now 
Burlington.  Traces  of  this  trail,  known  for  over  a 
hundred  years  as  the  "  Burlington  Path,"  could  until 
recently  be  distinctly  seen.  There  were  one  or  two 
primitive  inns  en  route  by  1695,  and  the  province 
appropriated  ten  pounds  annually  for  repairs  to  these 
"highways,"  which;  so  late  as  1715,  were  only  passable 
for  horsemen  or  pedestrians. 

It  was  along  the  southern  branch  of  this  trail  that 
George  Fox  travelled  in  1672,  to  visit  the  Quakers  of 
New  England,  Long  Island,  and  East  Jersey.  On  his 
way  east,  Fox  tells  us  that  they  had  difficulty  in  procuring 
guides. 

"They  were  hard  to  get,"  he  says,  "and  very  chargeable. 
Then  had  we  that  wilderness  country  to  pass  through,  since 
called  West  New  Jersey,  not  then  inhabited  by  English,  so  that 
we  have  travelled  a  whole  day  together,  without  seeing  man  or 
woman,  house,  or  dwelling-place.  Sometimes  we  lay  in  the 
woods  by  a  fire,  and  sometimes  in  the  Indians'  wigwams  or 
houses.  We  came  one  night  to  an  Indian  town  and  lay  at  the 
king's  house,  who  was  a  very  worthy  man.  Both  he  and  his 
wife  received  us  very  lovingly,  and  his  attendants  (such  as  they 
were)  were  very  respectful  to  us.  They  laid  us  mats  to  lie  on, 
but  provision  was  very  short  with  them,  having  caught  but  little 


360    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

that  day.  At  another  Indian  town,  where  we  stayed,  the  king 
came  to  us  and  he  could  speak  some  English.  I  spoke  to  him 
much,  and  also  to  his  people,  and  they  were  very  loving  to  us." l 

The  Quaker  invariably  met  with  similar  treatment 
from  the  savages,  who  were  always  kind  when  unprovoked. 
Fox  was  on  his  way  to  the  General  Meeting  in  Rhode 
Island,  that  memorable  occasion  when  : 

"  The  glorious  power  of  the  Lord  which  was  over  all,  and  His 
blessed  truth  and  life  flowing  amongst  them,  had  so  knit  and 
united  them  together,  that  they  spent  two  days  in  taking  leave 
one  of  another,  and  of  the  Friends  of  the  Island,  and  then,  being 
mightily  filled  with  the  presence  and  power  of  the  Lord,  they 
went  away  with  joyful  hearts  to  their  various  habitations."  2 

Returning  by  way  of  Flushing  and  Gravesend,  at  each 
place  finding  Quaker  settlers,  Fox  and  his  companions, 
among  whom  were  William  Edmundson  and  Robert 
Widders,  came  to  Richard  Hartshorne's  at  Middletown,  the 
"twenty-sixth  of  Sixth  month,"  1672.  He  describes  the 
bad  bogs  and  swamps  they  had  to  cross  before  reaching 
Shrewsbury,  where,  on  the  first  day,  "  they  had  a  large 
and  precious "  meeting.  Men's  and  women's  meetings 
were  held,  to  which  came  Friends  "  out  of  most  parts  of 
New  Jersey.  They  are  building  a  meeting-house  in  the 
midst  of  them,  and  there  is  a  Monthly  and  General 
meeting  set  up,  which  will  be  of  great  service  in  those 
parts."  While  at  Shrewsbury  the  accident  befell  John 
Jay,  the  Barbadoes  planter,  who  was  also  in  the  party. 
Thrown  from  his  horse  with  violence,  he  fell  upon  his 
head,  and  was  taken  up  for  dead  by  his  companions. 
But  Fox,  with  the  ready  common  sense  of  the  experienced 
traveller,  found  his  neck  not  broken  but  dislocated. 

"I  took  his  head  in  both  my  hands,"  says  Fox  in  relating 
the  incident,  "  and  setting  my  knees  against  a  tree,  I  raised  his 
head  and  perceived  there  was  nothing  out  or  broken  that  way. 
Then  I  put  one  hand  under  his  chin  and  the  other  behind  his 
head  and  raised  his  head  two  or  three  times  with  all  my  strength 
and  brought  it  in.  I  soon  perceived  his  neck  began  to  grow 
stiff  again,  and  then  he  began  to  rattle  in  the  throat  and  quickly 
to  breathe."3 

1  Journal,  ii.  166.  2  Ibid. ,  ii.  160.  *  Ibid. ,  ii.  176. 


CH.I        SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS        361 

With  returning  consciousness  he  was  carried  into  the 
house  and  laid  by  the  fire,  when  Fox  ordered  bed  and  a 
warm  drink  to  be  administered  ;  "  and  the  next  day  we 
passed  away  (and  he  with  us,  pretty  well),"  riding  sixteen 
miles ! 

Fox  set  off  from  Middletown  on  the  return  journey, 
the  "  9  of  7  mo.",  travelling  forty  or  fifty  miles  a  day. 

"At  night,  finding  an  old  house  which  the  Indians  had 
forced  the  people  to  leave,  we  made  a  fire  and  stayed  there  at 
the  head  of  Delaware  Bay.  Next  day  we  swam  our  horses  over, 
about  a  mile,  at  twice,  first  to  an  island  called  Upper  Dinidock 
[Matiniconk]  and  then  to  the  mainland,  having  hired  Indians  to 
help  us  over  in  their  canoes." l 

The  vacant  dwelling  which  sheltered  the  party  was  the 
house,  built  in  the  Swedish  fashion,  of  a  Dutchman,  Peter 
Jegou,  who  had  received  a  tavern  licence  from  Governor 
Carteret  in  1668.  The  Indians  plundered  and  drove  him 
away  for  some  offence  in  1670;  his  neighbours  apparently 
in  alarm  deserted  the  two  other  houses  of  which 
we  have  record  at  that  point.  George  Fox  landed  at 
Bristol,  England,  in  4th  mo.  1673,  where  his  wife  and 
other  members  of  his  family  joined  him.  With  them 
came  William  Penn  and  his  wife  Gulielma.  A  short  stay 
with  London  Friends  followed,  when  there  was  an 
interesting  house-party  at  Rickmansworth,  where  Penn's 
young  wife  was  hostess,  their  wedding  having  occurred  a 
few  months  before.  As  soon  as  Fox  left  Penn's  hospitable 
roof,  he  was  followed  and  taken  for  his  eighth  and  last 
imprisonment  It  is  not  too  much  to  infer  that  this  visit 

1  Journal,  ii.  177.  "Mattinagcom"  or  "Matiniconk,"  now  Burlington 
Island.  The  Indian  name  for  island  was  Tiniconk  or  Tenacong.  At  the  time 
Fox  crossed  the  Delaware,  this  island  was  known  as  Upper  Tineconk,  to  dis 
tinguish  it  from  Lower  Tineconk,  upon  which  now  stands  the  city  of  Burlington, 
close  to  the  east  shore  of  the  river.  It  is  easy  to  see  how  George  Fox  mistook 
the  unfamiliar  Indian  name.  Editors  of  his  Journal  have  further  confounded  the 
name  with  the  island  [or  "Tenacong"]  of  Tinicum,  named  and  settled  by  the 
Swedes,  near  Chester,  Pennsylvania.  Comparison  with  early  authorities  on 
the  subject  shows  Fox's  account  to  be  very  accurate,  ' '  near  the  head  of  the  Bay  " 
meaning,  undoubtedly,  near  the  head  of  navigation.  It  took  him  two  days' 
travel  over  seventy  miles  of  bad  roads  and  a  "desperate  river"  to  reach  New 
castle,  which  would  not  have  been  the  case  had  he  crossed  at  Tinicum.  [See 
Benjamin  Ferris,  History  of  the  Original  Settlements  on  the  Delaware  ;  Jasper 
Bankers  and  Peter  Sluyter,  Journal  of  a  Voyage  to  New  York,  1679  ;  Record  of 
the  Court  at  Upland,  Pennsylvania,  1676-1681,  etc.]. 


362   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

of  Fox,  with  his  report  fresh  from  the  Friends  in  America, 
must  have  made  a  great  impression  upon  William  Penn, 
then  a  young  man  of  eight  and  twenty. 

The  peaceful  conquest  of  New  Netherland  by  the 
English  in  1664  gave  its  royal  proprietor,  the  Duke  of 
York,  the  great  province  lying  between  the  "  North "  or 
Hudson  and  the  "  South  "  or  Delaware  rivers.  This,  for 
loyal  service,  was  at  once  granted  by  the  impoverished 
Duke  to  two  men  of  influence  at  Court — John,  Lord 
Berkeley,  Baron  of  Stratton,  a  brother  of  Sir  William 
Berkeley,  Governor  of  Virginia,  and  in  1674  Ambassador 
to  France  ;  and  Sir  George  Carteret,  a  turbulent  and 
interesting  man,  companion  of  Samuel  Pepys,  who 
frequently  mentions  him  in  his  famous  diary.  The  old 
Norman  family  of  de  Carteret  of  St  Ouen,  in  the  island 
of  Jersey,  was  prominent  for  many  generations  in  history. 
The  present  representative  had  gallantly  defended  Jersey 
against  the  Roundheads,  and  was  the  last  Commander  to 
lower  the  King's  flag.  In  compliment,  therefore,  to  him, 
the  province  received  the  Latin  name  for  the  island, 
"  Nova  Caesarea,"  but  the  vernacular  was  from  the  first 
preferred  by  the  people,  and  except  on  early  seals, 
documents,  etc.,  the  new  acquisition  was  known  as  New 
Jersey.  Sir  George  was  sixty-one  years  of  age  at  this 
time,  a  member  of  the  Privy  Council  of  Charles  II.,  and 
Vice-Chancellor  of  the  Household.  As  the  representative 
of  the  owners,  Philip  Carteret,  a  relative  of  Sir  George, 
was  sent  out,  and  in  1668  the  first  Assembly  convened 
at  Elizabethtown.  Such,  however,  were  the  dissensions 
as  to  the  veto  power  of  the  Governor,  the  adjustment  of 
quit-rents,  and  the  taxation  of  the  colonists,  that  it  was 
seven  years  before  another  Assembly  could  be  called 
which  was  other  than  illegal.  A  slight  period  of  Dutch 
rule  was  followed  in  1674  by  permanent  English 
possession,  the  right  to  legislate  independently  having 
meantime  been  demanded  by  the  people.  The  Treaty  of 
Westminster1  necessitated  the  bestowal  anew  of  the 

1  Signed  gth  February  1674,  when  the  Prince  of  Orange  made  over  the  Dutch 
possessions  to  King  Charles  II. 


CH.  i         SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS         363 

province  by  the  King  upon  the  Duke  of  York,  by  whom 
were  disregarded  the  claims  alike  of  those  who  held  title 
under  him,  and  under  Berkeley  and  Carteret.  Amid  the 
technicalities  that  followed,  Sir  George  Carteret  demanded 
and  obtained  from  the  Duke  a  separate  grant  of  East 
Jersey,  with  a  division  line  loosely  drawn  from  Barnegat 
Bay  on  the  coast,  to  just  below  Rancocas  Creek  on  the 
Delaware ;  both  the  Jerseys  remained  under  the  ad 
ministration  of  Sir  Edmund  Andros,  Governor  of  New 
York  until  1680,  when  Carteret  discomfited  Andros  at  a 
special  Court  of  Assize,  thus  securing  the  independency 
of  both  the  Jerseys.  In  1674  Lord  Berkeley  had  become 
a  very  old  man,  and  his  finances,  as  one  result  of  the 
quit-rent  quarrel,  had  materially  shrunk.  Disheartened  by 
the  situation,  he  determined  to  sell,  preferably  to  the 
Quakers,  and  this  became  their  opportunity.  In  March 
of  that  year  he  conveyed  the  whole  of  the  vast  estate  to 
two  Quakers — John  Fenwick,  a  Buckinghamshire  yeoman, 
and  Edward  Byllynge,  a  merchant  of  London,  for  the 
sum  of  one  thousand  pounds  ! 

This  moment  marks  the  entrance  of  the  Quaker  into 
the  affairs  of  government  in  the  middle  colonies,  following 
the  example  of  Rhode  Island,  where  the  Quakers  had 
long  been  the  administrators  of  the  law  and  of  the  King. 
It  was  by  no  accident  that  this  purchase  took  place  within 
a  short  time  after  the  return  of  George  Fox  to  England 
from  America,  and  Bowden  is  doubtless  right  when  he 
says  that  the  property  was  acquired  for  the  benefit  of  the 
Society  at  large.  Fenwick  was  a  litigious  old  Crom- 
wellian  soldier  recently  converted  to  Quakerism,  and  the 
details  of  a  dispute  between  him  and  his  partner  cannot 
here  be  recited.  The  actual  facts  at  this  distance  of  time 
are  hazy,  and  are  only  vaguely  referred  to  in  two  or  three 
letters1  from  William  Penn,  written  while  the  latter  was 
acting  as  arbitrator.  The  quarrel  resulted  in  a  division 
of  the  property,  one-tenth  being  awarded  to  Fenwick, 
while  complications  in  business  soon  forced  Byllynge  to 

1  Three  of  these  are  quoted  by  Bowden,  History  of  Friends  in  America, 
\.  391,  from  the  Harleian  MSS.  in  the  British  Museum. 


364   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

assign  his  nine-tenths  in  trust  for  his  creditors  to  William 
Penn,  Gawen  Lawrie,  and  Nicholas  Lucas,  all  of  them 
Quakers.  Subsequently,  Fenwick's  tenth  also  came  under 
their  control. 

The  idea  of  emigration  to  England's  western  possessions 
had  been  rapidly  maturing  in  the  minds  of  the  leading 
Quakers,  led  doubtless  by  William  Penn.  Penn  had 
been  associated  with  John  Locke,  the  philosopher,  in 
drawing  up  a  theory  of  government  for  Carolina,  and 
Berkeley  and  Carteret  were  both  already  proprietors  of 
the  southern  colony  when  they  became  owners  also  of 
the  Jerseys.  The  part  taken  by  William  Penn  in  the 
settlement  of  New  Jersey  has  never  yet  received  due 
recognition  from  any  historian.  No  sudden  inspiration 
led  him  to  ask  of  Charles  the  grant  for  Pennsylvania  in 
liquidation  of  the  debt  of  the  crown  to  his  father.  George 
Fox  made  his  report  to  him  in  1673,  and  when,  in  the 
following  year,  his  friend  and  neighbour  John  Fenwick, 
near  Rickmansworth,  besought  his  aid  as  arbitrator,  he 
was  obliged  to  give  attention  to  conditions  in  the  new 
country.  His  trusteeship  for  Byllynge  immediately  after, 
necessitated  further  acquaintance  with  the  situation.  It 
is  not  too  much  to  assert  that  these  services  as  arbitrator 
and  trustee  were  the  immediate  causes  leading  to  his  East 
Jersey  proprietorship,  and  ultimately  to  the  settlement  of 
Pennsylvania. 

The  "  Concessions,"  etc.,  signed  by  Berkeley  and 
Carteret  were  drawn  up  by  a  group  of  men,  not  one  of 
whom  was  familiar  with  the  country  or  its  inhabitants  for 
whom  they  legislated.  The  terms  were  liberal,  and  the 
laws  tolerant,  but  the  whole  was  based  upon  theory. 
The  second  "  Concessions  and  Agreements  of  the  Pro 
prietors,  Freeholders,  and  Inhabitants  of  West  Jersey,  in 
America  "  gave  to  the  spirit  of  liberty  a  wider  range  than 
had  heretofore  been  the  case  in  any  record  of  Anglo-Saxon 
organic  law.  These  Concessions  are  dated  3rd  March 
1676  (O.S.),  after  the  return  from  America  of  Coale, 
Burnyeat,  Fox,  and  Edmundson — all  men  of  intelligence 
and  experience,  who,  we  know  from  their  journals,  reported 


CH.I         SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS        365 

the  character  of  the  country  and  the  situation  of  the 
settlers  then  beginning  to  come  in,  to  William  Penn  and 
his  advisers.  Lucas  and  Lavvrie  were  business  men, 
little  versed  in  statecraft,  and  Penn  himself  was  at  this 
time  but  thirty-two,  The  making  of  constitutions  was  a 
fashionable  amusement.  It  had  occupied  Penn's  friends, 
Locke  and  Algernon  Sidney,  chiefly  as  a  means  of 
illustrating  their  theories  of  freedom  and  philanthropy. 
But  the  Quakers  had  known  persecution,  and  it  had 
taught  them  and  their  leaders  the  value  of  personal 
freedom,  and  of  liberty  of  conscience.  The  Concessions 
were  placed  for  signature  by  the  subscribers,  (who  did  not 
all  sign  at  once)  in  London,  and  were  probably  later  taken 
to  Yorkshire,  as  the  grouping  of  signatures  would  lead 
one  to  fancy,  for  the  same  purpose.  Then,  as  though 
with  a  sigh  of  relief,  Penn  and  his  partners  wrote  to  the 
most  prominent  Quaker  in  the  Jerseys,  Richard  Hartshorne 
at  Middletown,  from  London,  26th  June  1676-. 

"We  have  made  concessions  by  ourselves,  being  such  as 
Friends  here  and  there  (we  question  not)  will  approve  of.  ... 
There  we  lay  a  foundation  for  after  ages  to  understand  their 
liberty  as  men  and  Christians,  that  they  may  not  be  brought  in 
bondage  but  by  their  own  consent,  for  we  put  the  power  in  the 
people." 

There  breathes  in  the  great  charter  for  New  Jersey, 
whose  anonymous  author  is  beyond  doubt  William  Penn, 
a  spirit  of  religious  and  political  freedom  that  is  even  more 
marked  than  when,  seven  years  later,  he  came  to  draw  up 
the  famous  "  Frame  of  Government "  for  his  own 
Pennsylvania. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  East  Jersey  remained  the 
property  of  Sir  George  Carteret  alone,  while  West  Jersey 
thus  became  a  Quaker  colony.  The  Quakers  at  once 
set  about  publishing  and  distributing  literature  inviting 
their  people  to  emigrate  to  the  new  country,  some  of 
these  pamphlets  being  so  enthusiastic  in  character  that 
the  conscientious  Penn  issued  a  caution  lest  the  unpre 
pared  find  the  expected  paradise  too  great  a  wilder 
ness.  He  and  his  partners  in  the  trust,  in  their 


366    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

cautionary  address,  after  stating  the  facts  of  the  purchase, 
continue : 

"  The  ninety  parts  remaining  are  exposed  for  sale  on  behalf 
of  the  creditors  of  Edward  Byllynge.  And  forasmuch  as  several 
Friends  are  concerned  as  creditors  as  well  as  others,  and  the 
disposal  of  so  great  a  part  of  this  country  being  in  our  hands, 
we  did  in  real  tenderness  and  regard  to  Friends  and  especially 
the  poor  and  necessitous,  make  Friends  the  first  offer,  that  if 
any  of  them,  though  particularly  those  that,  being  low  in  the 
world,  and  under  trials  about  a  comfortable  livelihood  for  them 
selves  and  families,  should  be  desirous  of  dealing  for  any  part  or 
parcel  thereof,  that  they  might  have  the  refusal.  This  was  the 
real  and  honest  intent  of  our  hearts,  and  not  to  prompt  or 
allure  any  out  of  their  places,  either  by  the  credit  our  names 
might  have  with  our  people  throughout  the  nation,  or  by 
representing  the  thing  otherwise  than  it  is  in  itself." 

It  was,  therefore,  with  a  pretty  clear  idea  of  the  real 
facts,  and  with  full  understanding  of  difficulties  ahead  of 
them,  that  the  first  Quaker  emigration  to  West  Jersey 
began,  when,  in  1675,  John  Fen  wick  sailed  with  a  number 
of  Quakers  in  the  ship  Griffin,  from  London,  landing  at 
a  spot,  which,  from  the  "  delightsomenesse  of  the  land,"  he 
called  Salem.  Nearly  all  were  Quakers,  and  they  at  once 
began  holding  meetings,  a  monthly  meeting  being  set  up 
the  next  year  after  their  coming.  Meantime,  Penn  and 
his  associates  were  rapidly  selling  off  portions  of  the 
Byllynge  estate,  and  a  number  of  Quakers  who  were  the 
latter's  creditors  accepted  lands  in  liquidation  of  the  debt. 
Thus  were  acquired  the  properties  held  in  such  familiar 
names  in  modern  times  as  Hutchinson,  Pearson,  Stacy, 
and  many  others. 

The  next  year,  1677,  was  made  the  second  important 
effort  at  colonisation,  when  the  ship  Kent,  from  London 
made  the  Delaware  safely  in  October  of  that  year, 
landing  her  passengers,  numbering  two  hundred  and 
thirty,  at  Raccoon  Creek.  The  departure  of  so  large  a 
group  of  Quakers  at  one  time  attracted  public  attention 
in  England,  and  was  observed  with  interest  by  the  King, 
who  took  his  yacht  in  the  Thames  to  see  the  unusual 
sight.  Greeted  by  his  loyal  subjects,  he  asked  if  they 


CH.I        SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS         367 

were  all  Quakers,  and  gave  them  his  blessing.  Upon 
landing,  the  settlers,  acting  under  the  instructions  of  Penn 
and  his  colleagues,  proceeded  at  once  to  the  site  of  what 
is  now  Burlington,  which,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  the 
spot  where  Fox  had  swum  his  horse  across  five  years 
before,  and  which,  with  the  keen  eye  of  the  experienced 
and  observant  explorer,  he  had  recorded  in  his  journal. 
Here  a  town  was  laid  out,  and  the  company  being  equally 
divided  between  London  and  Yorkshire  Friends,  it  fell  to 
the  latter  to  give  it  a  name,  and  Bridlington  or  Burling 
ton  was  chosen,  from  the  town  of  that  name  whence  many 
came.  The  home-sick  longing  for  familiar  English  names 
accounts  for  the  disappearance  of  most  of  the  beautiful 
Indian  local  names  throughout  the  middle  colonies. 
Interesting  details  of  the  settlement  and  apportionment  of 
land  are  given  by  Smith.1  The  Quakers  "  treated  with 
the  Indians  about  lands,"  and  purchases  were  made  from 
the  natives,  but  as  the  settlers  had  not  goods  sufficient  for 
all  they  had  bought,  the  land  was  not  occupied  until  it 
was  fully  paid  for.  Herein  they  followed  precedent,  for 
to  the  Dutchman  is  due  the  credit  of  giving  the  Indians 
full  value  for  what  lands  they  occupied  or  claimed.  It 
was  not  money  that  was  lacking.  The  supply  of  trinkets, 
jews'  harps,  and  brass  buttons  gave  out.  An  example  of 
one  purchase  will  suffice  for  the  rest. 

"30  matchcoats,  20  guns,  30  kettles,  and  one  great  one,  30 
pair  hose,  20  fathom  of  duffields,  30  petticoats,  30  narrow  hoes, 
30  bars  of  lead,  15  small  barrels  of  powder,  70  knives,  30  Indian 
axes,  70  combs,  60  pair  tobacco  tongs,  60  scissors,  69  tinshaw 
looking-glasses,  120  awl-blades,  120  fish-hooks,  2  grasps  of  red 
paint,  120  needles,  60  tobacco  boxes,  120  pipes,  200  bells,  100 
Jews'  harps,  6  anchors  rum." 

Soon  after  the  settlement  made  at  Burlington,  another 
ship  from  London  brought  within  the  year  seventy  more 
passengers,  who  divided  between  Burlington  and  Salem, 
and  another  from  Hull  brought  one  hundred  and  fourteen 
more.  Next  year,  in  1678,  in  the  Shield  from  Hull, 
came  over  a  hundred  more  settlers,  followed  closely  by  a 

1  Samuel  Smith,  History  of  New  Jersey,  p.  98,  2nd  edition. 


368    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

London  craft  whose  name  is  not  known.  Fully  eight 
hundred  Quakers  joined  and  settled  in  the  new  colony 
within  the  first  eighteen  months,  many  of  them  persons 
of  large  property  and  wide  influence  ;  while  up  to  the 
year  1681,  at  which  time  William  Penn  was  negotiating 
for  the  purchase  of  Pennsylvania,  upwards  of  fourteen 
hundred  had  found  their  way  to  the  new  province. 

Sir  George  Carteret's  death  in  1679  necessitated  the 
sale  of  East  Jersey  by  his  widow  to  pay  his  debts.  The 
opportunity  was  again  seized  by  the  watchful  Penn  and 
his  associates,  who,  pleased  with  the  success  of  their  first 
effort  at  colonisation,  after  a  slight  delay,  purchased  the 
eastern  province.  In  February  1681  it  was  conveyed  to 
William  Penn  and  eleven  other  Friends.  These  immedi 
ately  joined  with  them  twelve  others  as  owners,  among 
whom  were  Robert  Barclay,  the  Earl  of  Perth,  Lord 
Drummond,  and  several  other  prominent  Scotchmen,  not 
Quakers.  These  twenty- four  proprietors  formed  a 
"  Council  of  Proprietors,"  that  for  East  Jersey  being 
appointed  in  1684,  and  that  for  West  Jersey  in  1687. 
These  together  were  established  as  the  original  Council  of 
Proprietors,  which,  upon  the  accession  of  Queen  Anne,  in 
1702,  unconditionally  surrendered  the  right  of  govern 
ment  for  the  united  province  of  New  Jersey  into  the  royal 
hands,  the  acceptance  of  which  surrender  was  one  of  the 
first  official  acts  of  that  eventful  reign.  This  unique  body 
retained,  however,  its  proprietary  rights,  and  exists  to-day, 
with  quaint  ceremonies  of  proclamation  on  the  street 
corners  of  Burlington  and  Gloucester,  to  effect  an 
occasional  sale  or  transfer  of  the  few  unclaimed  lands  on 
the  New  Jersey  coasts  of  which  they  are  still  the  rightful 
owners.  The  organisation  is  the  oldest  existing  pro 
prietary  body  in  America. 

The  choice  of  Governor  for  the  newly  purchased 
Quaker  territory  fell  upon  Robert  Barclay  of  Ury,  author 
of  the  "  Apology,"  who  accepted  the  trust,  but  never  came 
out,  and  Thomas  Rudyard  was  made  his  deputy.  Upon 
the  latter's  death  soon  after,  Gawen  Lawrie  took  his 
place.  The  attention  of  the  Scotch,  who  were  then  and 


CH.I         SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS        369 

shortly  after  suffering  in  the  Cameronian  wars,  was  directed 
to  the  lands  in  East  Jersey  by  their  countrymen  of  power 
and  influence,  who  followed  the  example  of  the  Quaker 
owners  of  the  western  division  in  the  distribution  of  much 
literature  setting  forth  the  advantages  of  emigration. 
They  were  very  far  from  coming  to  similar  conditions 
to  those  in  West  Jersey,  there  being  at  this  date  nearly 
five  thousand  inhabitants  already  settled  in  the  eastern 
division.  A  large  number  of  Scotch  and  Quakers  came 
into  Monmouth  county  in  the  next  few  years,  the  former 
being  of  the  "  Auld  Kirk  " — Covenanters  and  Presbyterians. 

Among  the  Scottish  Quakers  was  George  Keith,  whose 
presence  in  the  Jerseys  was  soon  to  become  a  matter  of 
no  slight  importance  in  the  history  of  Quakerism.  Born 
in  1638,  of  the  Keiths  of  Keith  Hall,  Aberdeenshire,  he 
took  his  M.A.  at  the  University  of  Aberdeen  in  1662, 
about  which  time,  in  the  heat  and  fire  of  his  youth,  he 
left  the  rigid  form  of  Presbyterianism  in  which  he  had 
been  brought  up,  to  embrace  the  doctrines  of  Quakerism. 
He  was  a  surveyor  and  mathematician,  but  seems  to  have 
given  up  most  of  his  time  to  preaching,  which,  together 
with  his  share  in  the  famous  discussion  of  Quakerism  in 
1675  at  the  University  of  Aberdeen,  in  company  with 
Alexander  Jaffray  and  Robert  Barclay,  occasioned  one  of 
several  imprisonments.  Various  theories  have  been 
advanced  as  to  the  object  of  his  emigration  to  America  ; 
the  chief  reasons  given  are  his  choice  by  Barclay  to  run 
the  "  Province  Line,"  and  his  selection  as  master  for  William 
Penn's  new  school  in  Philadelphia.  It  is  no  more 
necessary  to  seek  for  an  ulterior  motive  in  the  case  of 
Keith  than  in  that  of  any  of  the  other  Friends  who  went 
to  America  to  improve  their  fortunes  and  to  live  in  peace. 

Keith's  intimate  acquaintance  with  the  Barclays  was 
doubtless  a  large  factor  in  his  determination  to  emigrate. 
The  provincial  records  show  that  in  1684  he  arrived  with 
his  wife  Anna,  his  daughters  Anna  and  Eliza,  an 
apprentice  named  Richard  Hodkins,  and  two  maid 
servants,  Mary  Smith  and  Christian  Ghaine.  Robert 
Bridgman,  a  merchant,  came  with  him  and  "imported 

2  B 


370   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

himself."  Keith  was  shortly  after  made  Surveyor- 
General  of  East  Jersey,  and  joined  Andrew  Robeson,  who 
held  a  similar  office  for  the  Western  division,  in  1686  in 
running  the  famous  "  Province  Line,"  which,  after  two 
centuries  of  dispute,  was  in  1886  finally  confirmed  by  a 
special  board  of  commissioners.  The  tracts  of  land  taken 
up  by  Keith  in  Monmouth  county,  near  Freehold,  where 
he  first  settled,  were  gradually  disposed  of  in  lots  to 
various  purchasers,  and  he  removed  in  1689  to 
Philadelphia,  to  take  up  once  more  his  calling  of  school 
master,  which  he  had  been  pursuing  in  Edmonton, 
England,  at  the  time  of  his  determination  to  emigrate. 
Between  this  date  and  that  of  his  expulsion  from  the 
Society  for  schism  by  the  Yearly  Meeting  at  Burlington 
in  1692,  his  history  belongs  to  that  of  Pennsylvania 
Quakerism.  His  next  appearance  upon  the  soil  of  New 
Jersey  is  as  the  accredited  agent  for  the  newly  created 
Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel  in  Foreign 
Parts,  in  which  capacity  he  laid  the  foundation  stone  of 
St  Mary's  Episcopal  church  in  Burlington,  in  1703,  and 
was  instrumental  in  establishing  Episcopalianism  upon  a 
sure  basis  in  the  Jerseys,  at  the  cost  of  many  converts 
from  Quakerism. 

Connected  with  the  Keith  controversy  were  the  two 
printers,  Daniel  Leeds  of  West  Jersey,  and  William 
Bradford  of  Philadelphia.  The  latter  removed  to  New 
York  early  in  the  history  of  the  schism,  but  it  is  supposed 
that  for  a  short  time,  his  press  was  set  up  at  Burlington. 
Leeds's  "  Allmanack  "  was  suppressed  by  the  meeting,  and 
he  himself  forced  to  make  an  acknowledgment  for  his 
statements,  which,  the  Friends  said,  "  evinced  a  froward 
spirit."  He  became  on  intimate  terms  with  the  "  Mystics '" 
in  Germantown,  approved  and  published  their  astrological 
predictions,  and  finally  joined  the  "  Christian  Quakers,"  as 
the  Keithian  separatists  preferred  to  call  themselves. 

Thus  came  the  Quaker  settlers  into  the  fertile  lands 
of  the  Jerseys.  Many  hardships  had  to  be  endured,  but, 
thanks  to  an  abundant  and  bountiful  return  for  their  first 
efforts  in  the  field,  they  were  spared  nearly  all  the  suffer- 


CH.  i         SETTLEMENT  OF  THE  JERSEYS        371 

ing  and  sorrows  which,  in  a  more  unfriendly  climate,  fell 
to  the  lot  of  the  Pilgrims  in  Massachusetts.  Many 
enthusiastic  letters  home,  from  which  it  is  a  temptation  to 
quote,  still  exist  in  praise  of  the  new  country.  "  I  like 
the  place  well,"  said  one,  "  it's  like  to  be  a  healthful 
place,  and  very  pleasant  to  live  in."  "It  is  a  country," 
writes  another,  "  that  produceth  all  things  for  the  support 
and  sustenance  of  man."  "  Whatever  envy  or  evil  spies 
may  speak  of  it,  I  could  wish  you  all  here,"  declared  a 
third.1  Not  lightly  did  they  speak.  Many  of  the  little 
company  had  lain  in  loathsome  English  gaols,  and  many 
of  their  sufferings  may  be  found  described  by  Besse.2 
They  had  proved  their  faithfulness ;  had  borne  their 
persecutions  patiently  ;  they  had  declared,  as  had  Penn 
for  them,  that  they  were  not  fleeing  to  escape  trials  that 
they  were  called  upon  longer  to  endure.  Justified  by 
their  years  of  hardship,  now  they  longed  for  the  wider 
outlook  which  provided  a  secure  home  for  their  children 
in  the  future.  "  I  wish,"  wrote  one  of  the  number  3  years 
after,  "  I  wish  that  they  that  come  after  may  remember 
these  things."  "  The  settlement  of  this  country,"  says 
another  witness,  "was  directed  by  an  impulse  on  the 
spirit  of  God's  people,  not  for  their  own  ease  and 
tranquillity,  but  rather  for  the  posterity  which  should  be 
after  them." 4  It  was  not  commercialism  which  established 
them  so  firmly  in  the  new  country.  The  trading  spirit, 
strangely  enough,  has  never  yet  sufficed  for  effectual 
colonisation.  Men  of  good  estate,  their  English  homes 
were  not  left  without  a  sigh. 

"O  remember  us,"  they  write,  "for  we  cannot  forget  you. 
Many  waters  cannot  quench  our  love,  nor  distance  wipe  out  the 
deep  remembrance.  .  .  .  Though  the  Lord  hath  been  pleased 
to  remove  us  far  away  from  you,  as  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  yet 
are  you  present  with  us.  Your  exercises  are  ours,  our  hearts  are 
dissolved  in  the  remembrance  of  you." 

1  S.  Smith.  History  of  Nova  Caesarea,  or  New  Jersey,  where  various  letters  are 
given  more  at  length. 

2  J.  Besse,  Sufferings  of  the  Quakers,  2  vols.  folio. 

8  Mary  Murfin  Smith,  who  came  as  a  child  with  her  parents.     Drowned  in 
1739- 

4  Thomas  Sharp,  Newtown  Monthly  Meeting  Records. 


CHAPTER    II 

MEETINGS   AND    SOCIAL   LIFE 

THE  Friends'  first  care  was  to  settle  meetings.  These, 
both  at  Salem  and  Burlington,  like  the  services  of  the 
first  comers  to  Virginia,  were  held  in  tents  made  of  the 
sails  of  their  ships.  They  next  met  in  their  own  dwell 
ings,  and  the  early  minutes  of  most  of  the  meetings  of  the 
Jerseys  begin  in  a  private  house,  before  any  record  can 
be  found  of  a  meeting-house.  Very  soon,  however,  there 
was  an  effort  to  build  suitable  accommodation  for  the 
increasing  numbers.  The  original  meeting  for  the 
middle  colonies  appears  to  have  been  at  Shrewsbury, 
where  one  was  settled  as  early  as  1670,  and  where 
George  Fox  mentions  the  building  of  a  meeting-house 
going  on  at  the  time  of  his  visit  in  1672.  These 
Quakers  were  from  New  England,  the  first  child  born  in 
the  settlement  in  1667,  according  to  an  old  authority, 
having  been  Elizabeth,  daughter  of  Eliakim  Wardell, 
who,  with  his  wife  Lydia,  in  1665  had  been  cruelly  and 
publicly  scourged  for  the  appearance  of  the  latter  almost 
unclothed  as  a  "  sign  "  before  the  Puritan  congregation  in 
the  meeting-house  at  their  New  England  home  in 
Hampton.  They  would  seem  to  have  taken  refuge  in 
East  Jersey,  where  Bowden  l  refers  to  their  residence  two 
years  later.  Doubtless  meetings  had  existed  in  the 
Jerseys  a  few  years  before.  The  meeting  began  at  Salem 
in  1675,  and  the  next  year  the  monthly  meeting  was  set 
up,  being  held  for  some  time  in  the  dwelling  house  of 
hewn  logs  belonging  to  Samuel  Nicholson.  Bowden  calls 

1  Bowden,  History  of  Friends  in  America,  i.  405. 
372 


CH.II          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  373 

attention  to  the  fact,  which  is  impressive,  that  several  of  the 
American  meetings  were  organised  in  the  interval  between 
the  first  proposal  of  monthly  meetings  by  Fox  at  Durham, 
1653,  and  their  regular  establishment  in  England  thirteen 
years  later. 

Seven  months  after  the  landing  at  Raccoon  Creek,  a 
Monthly  Meeting  was  set  up  at  Burlington.  The  minutes 
begin  with  the  following  preamble : 

"  Since  by  the  good  Providence  of  God,  many  Friends  with 
their  families  have  transported  themselves  into  this  Province  of 
West  New  Jersey,  the  said  Friends  in  these  upper  parts  have 
found  it  needfull,  according  to  our  practice  in  the  place  wee  came 
from,  to  settle  Monthly  Meetings  for  the  well  ordering  the  affairs 
of  ye  Church  it  was  agreed  that  accordingly  it  should  be  done, 
and  accordingly  it  was  done  the  i5th  of  ye  5th  mo111.  1678." 

Many  small  meetings  were  held  in  scattered  planta 
tions  not  many  miles  removed  from  each  other,  since  the 
"  going,"  according  to  early  minutes,  was  too  bad  in 
inclement  weather  to  allow  Friends  to  journey  far.  Very 
willingly  the  different  settlements  aided  each  other  in 
clearing  roads,  and  the  old  colonial  highway,  still  known 
as  the  "  Salem  Road,"  was  laid  out  by  ten  men  from 
Salem  and  ten  from  Burlington,  at  the  people's  expense. 

The  first  meetings  in  Burlington  were  held  at  the 
house  of  Thomas  Gardiner.  From  here  the  Monthly 
Meeting,  under  date  "7th  of  ye  I2th  mo.  1680,"  sent 
what  Bowden  asserts  to  have  been  the  earliest  recorded 
epistle  addressed  to  London  Yearly  Meeting  by  any 
meeting  in  America.  Care  for  the  spiritual  welfare  of 
their  savage  neighbours  and  provision  for  their  poorer 
members  are  evident  from  the  early  minutes  ;  but  the 
necessity  for  proper  certificates  as  to  the  character  of  the 
new-comers  who  so  soon  appeared,  made  the  presentation 
of  proper  credentials,  particularly  in  cases  of  marriage,  of 
paramount  importance.  No  less  than  thirteen  couples  in 
the  first  three  years  presented  themselves  with  that  object 
before  the  meeting  in  Burlington.  Hence  the  following 
document  was  sent  to  London. 


374   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

"To  our  Dear  Friends  and  Brethren  at  the  Yearly  Meeting  at 
London. 

"  DEAR  FRIENDS  AND  BRETHREN — Whom  God  hath  honoured 
with  his  heavenly  presence  and  dominion,  as  some  of  us  have 
been  eye  witnesses  (and  in  our  measures  partakers  with  you)  in 
those  solemn  annual  assemblies  ;  in  the  remembrance  of  which 
our  souls  are  consolated,  and  do  bow  before  the  Lord  with 
reverent  acknowledgment  to  him,  to  whom  it  belongs  forever. 

"  And,  dear  friends,  being  fully  satisfied  of  your  love  and  care 
and  zeal  for  the  Lord  and  His  truth,  and  your  travail  and  desire 
for  the  promotion  of  it,  hath  given  us  encouragement  to  address 
ourselves  to  you,  to  request  your  assistance  in  these  following 
particulars,  being  sensible  of  the  need  of  it,  and  believing  it  will 
conduce  to  the  honour  of  God  and  the  benefit  of  His  people  ; 
for  the  Lord  having,  by  an  overruling  Providence,  cast  our  lots 
in  these  remote  parts  of  the  world,  our  care  and  desire  is  that 
He  may  be  honoured  in  us  and  through  us,  and  His  dear  truth 
which  we  may  profess  may  be  had  in  good  repute  and  esteem 
by  those  that  are  yet  strangers  to  it 

"  Dear  Friends,  our  first  request  unto  you  is,  that  in  your 
several  counties  and  meetings  out  of  which  any  may  transport 
themselves  in  this  place,  that  you  will  be  pleased  to  take  care 
that  we  may  have  certificates  concerning  them ;  for  here  are 
several  honest  and  innocent  people  that  brought  no  certificate 
with  them  from  their  respective  Monthly  Meetings,  not  foreseeing 
the  service  of  them,  and  so  never  desired  any,  which  for  the 
future,  in  cases  of  which  defect,  we  do  entreat  you  who  are 
sensible  of  the  need  for  certificates,  to  put  them  in  mind  of 
them ;  for  in  some  cases  where  certificates  are  required  (and 
they  have  none),  it  occasions  a  great  and  tedious  delay  before 
they  can  be  had  from  England,  besides  the  hazard  of  letters 
miscarrying,  which  is  very  uneasy  to  the  parties  immediately 
concerned,  and  no  ways  grateful  or  desirable  to  us  ;  yet  in  some 
cases  necessity  urgeth  it,  or  we  must  act  very  unsafely,  and 
particularly  in  cases  of  marriage  in  which  we  are  often  concerned. 

"  So  if  the  parties  are  single  and  marriageable  at  their  coming 
away,  we  desire  to  be  satisfied  of  their  clearness  or  unclearness 
from  other  parties,  and  what  else  you  think  meet  for  our  know 
ledge.  And  if  they  have  parents,  whether  they  will  commit 
them  to  the  care  of  Friends  in  general  in  that  matter,  or  appoint 
any  particular  person  in  whom  they  can  trust.  And  if  any  do 
incline  to  come  that  do  profess  truth  yet  walk  disorderly,  and  so 
become  dishonourable  to  truth  and  the  profession  they  have 
made  of  it,  we  desire  to  be  certified  of  them  and  it  by  some 
other  hand  (as  there  are  frequent  opportunities  from  London  of 


CH.  a          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  375 

doing  it)  for  we  are  sensible  that  here  are  several  that  left  no 
good  savour  in  their  native  land  from  whence  they  came,  and  it 
may  be  probable  that  more  of  that  kind  may  come,  thinking  to 
be  absconded  in  this  obscure  place ;  but,  blessed  be  the  Lord, 
He  hath  a  people  here  whom  He  hath  provoked  to  a  zealous 
affection  for  the  glory  of  His  name,  and  are  desirous  that  the 
hidden  things  of  Esau  may  be  brought  to  light,  and  in  it  be 
condemned ;  for  which  cause  we  thus  request  your  assistance  as 
an  advantage  and  furtherance  to  that  work ;  for  though  some 
have  not  thought  it  necessary  either  to  bring  certificates  them 
selves  or  require  it  of  others,  we  are  not  of  that  mind,  and  do 
leave  it  to  the  wise  in  heart  to  judge  whence  it  doth  proceed  ;  for 
though  we  desire  this  as  an  additional  help  to  us,  yet  not  as 
some  have  surmised,  that  we  wholly  build  upon  it,  without 
exercising  our  own  mediate  sense  as  God  shall  guide  us.  Some, 
we  know,  that  have  been  otherwise  deserving,  have  been  unad 
visedly  denied  their  impartial  right  of  a  certificate  and  very 
hardly  could  obtain  it,  merely  through  the  dislike  of  some  of 
their  undertaking  in  their  coming  hither,  which  we  believe  to  be 
an  injury  ;  and  though  we  would  not  have  any  should  reject  any 
sound  advice  or  counsel  in  that  matter ;  yet  we  do  believe  that 
all  the  faithful  ought  to  be  left  to  God's  direction  in  that  matter ; 
most  certainly  knowing  by  the  surest  evidence  that  God  hath  had 
a  hand  in  the  removal  of  some  to  this  place,  which  we  desire 
that  all  who  are  inclined  to  come  hither,  who  know  God,  may 
be  careful  to  know  before  they  attempt  it,  lest  their  trials  become 
insupportable  to  them,  but  if  this  they  know,  they  need  not  fear, 
for  the  Lord  is  known  by  sea  and  land  the  shield  and  strength  of 
them  that  fear  him. 

"And  dear  Friends,  one  thing  more  we  think  needful  to 
intimate  to  you,  to  warn  and  advise  all  that  come  professing  of 
truth,  that  they  be  careful  and  circumspect  in  their  passage. 

"  So,  dear  Friends,  this,  with  what  further  you  may  apprehend 
to  tend  to  truth's  promotion  in  this  place,  we  desire  your  assist 
ance  in,  which  will  be  very  kindly  and  gladly  received  by  us, 
who  are  desirous  of  an  amicable  correspondence  with  you,  and 
do  claim  a  part  with  you  in  the  holy  body  and  eternal  union, 
which  the  bond  of  life  is  the  strength  of,  in  which  God  preserve 
you  and  us,  who  are  your  friends  and  brothers." 

Here  follow  signatures  of  thirty-seven  Friends. 

"  From  our  Men's  Monthly  Meeting,  in  Burlington,  in  West  New 
Jersey,  the  ;th  of  the  Twelfth  Month,  1680."  l 

1  Bowden,  History  of  Friends  in  America,  i.  402,  et  scq. 


376   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

At  the  monthly  meeting  held  in  3  mo.  1681,  it  was 
determined  to  establish  a  Yearly  Meeting,  to  begin  in  the 

6  mo.  following.    Notice  to  this  effect  was  widely  circulated, 
and  the  transactions  of  the  meeting,  to  which  came  Friends 
from   New   England,  Long  Island,  and   as   far  south  as 
Maryland,  occupied  four  days.      Few  particulars  of  their 
business  remain.      Here  the  Yearly  Meeting  continued  to 
be  held  until   the  meeting-house  was   finished  which  was 
ordered  to  be  built  in   1682.      Thomas  Gardiner  died  in 
1694.      The  establishment  of  a  Quarterly  Meeting  was  a 
part  of  its  action,  as  the  first  minute  of  that  meeting  shows  : 

"  Whereas,  the  Yearly  Meeting  saw  it  necessary  yt  there 
should  be  Quarterly  meetings  kept  in  several  places  in  this 
Province  of  West  New  Jersey,  and  yt  this  Quarterly  Meeting  of 
Friends  for  Burlington  and  ye  Falls  should  be  held  at  ye  house  of 
William  Beedle  [Biddle]  in  Mansfield  (being  pretty  near  ye  middle 
of  Friends  belonging  to  it)  at  ye  times  hereafter  mentioned,  viz., 
upon  ye  last  second-day  of  the  9  mo. ;  last  second-day  of  ye 
1 2  mo. ;  last  second-day  of  ye  3  mo. ;  and  ye  last  second-day  of 
ye  6  mo. ;  and  to  begin  at  ye  loth  hour,  which  said  conclusion 
of  ye  Yearly  Meeting  ye  Friends  of  this  meeting  are  satisfied 
with. 

"29  of  9  mo.  1681." 

The  second   yearly  meeting   for  the   Jerseys   met   in 

7  mo.  (September)   1682.       In  the  interval  a  large  ship 
had    come    to   the    Delaware    shore,    and     landed    three 
hundred  and  sixty  more  settlers,  thus  greatly  augmenting 
their  numbers.      But  most  important  was  the  information 
they  brought  that  William  Penn  and  a  large  company  of 
Friends  were  about  to  sail   for  the  same  neighbourhood. 
Penn      landed     from     the      Welcome    at     Newcastle     in 
October    1682,    and    attended    the    Yearly    Meeting    at 
Burlington  in  1683.      At  this  meeting  it  was  proposed  to 
hold    a    Yearly    Meeting    for    all    the    North    American 
colonies,  but  the  proposition  fell  through.      In  it  may  be 
clearly  seen  the  guiding  hand  of  William  Penn.1 

The  first  meeting-house  in  Burlington  was  ordered  to 
be  built  in  1682,  but  was  delayed  for  several  years.  It 

1  Monthly  Meetings  were  established  at  Shrewsbury,  1670  ;  at  Salem,  1676 ; 
at  Burlington,  1678  ;  at  Newtown,  1681. 


CH.  ii          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE          377 

was  a  curious  little  octagonal  building,  with  no  means  of 
heating,  and  seems  to  have  been  copied  in  architecture  by 
Penn's  colony  in  their  first  house  soon  after.  Several 
examples  of  this  octagonal  style  of  building  for  places  of 
worship  and  for  schools  used  by  the  Dutch  and  the 
Quakers  still  exist  in  northern  New  Jersey  and  in 
Delaware  County,  Pennsylvania.  The  great  increase  in 
the  size  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  to  which  belonged  the 
Friends  from  Long  Island  to  Maryland,  including  the 
rapidly  growing  town  of  Philadelphia  twenty  miles  below, 
in  1696  necessitated  for  this  early  house  at  Burlington  a 
brick  addition,  capable  of  being  warmed  in  winter  by  huge 
fire-places.  Here  were  held  the  town-meetings,  the  school, 
and  the  Court,  and  on  the  doors  were  nailed  up  all  public 
notices,  whether  a  royal  proclamation,  the  required  banns 
for  a  marriage,  or  the  cattle  brand  assigned  to  each 
planter.1 

Sometimes  a  great  Indian  conference  drew  the  savages 
to  the  town.  The  Yearly  Meeting  of  1685  especially  con 
sidered  the  Indians,  and  in  1686  the  meeting  minutes 
desire  the  Indian  interpreters  to  be  notified  to  attend  the 
meeting  up  the  river  proposed  to  be  held  for  the  Indians 
by  Thomas  Budd  and  Robert  Stacey. 

The  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  saw  a  marvellous 
growth  of  Quakerism  in  New  Jersey,  attracting  much 
attention  in  England.  The  economic  and  social  life  of 
the  two  divisions  of  the  province  differed  as  much  as  did 
their  natural  features.  The  influence  of  Puritan  New 
England  was  as  marked  in  East  Jersey  as  was  the  more 
benign  and  peaceful,  not  to  say  indifferent,  attitude  of  the 
English  Quakers  in  West  Jersey.  In  the  former,  trade  on 
a  smaller  scale  flourished,  as  was  to  be  expected  of  a 
Puritan,  Dutch,  and  Quaker  alliance.  The  intense  ardour 
of  the  Calvinist  produced  a  note  of  individualism,  whose 
outcome  was  democracy,  expressed  in  the  town-meetings 
held  in  Quaker  meeting-houses,  its  religious  aspect  laying 
the  foundations  of  Presbyterian  ism  in  New  Jersey.  The 

1  An  interesting  census  for  1699  shows  the  number  of  West  Jersey  Freeholders 
who  were  Quakers  to  be  266  in  a  total  of  832.  The  report  (New  Jersey 
Archives,  ii.  305)  quotes  the  566  others  as  "  Christians,"  in  distinction  ! 


378    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

Quaker  of  West  Jersey,  naturally  a  Conservative,  clung 
closely  to  his  English  and  sectarian  institutions,  and, 
joining  acre  to  acre,  observing  the  custom  of  primogeniture, 
and  insisting  rigidly  on  the  ecclesiastical  law  which  com 
pelled  his  young  people  to  marry  within  the  pale  of  their 
membership,  he  built  up  gradually  a  great  land-owning 
class  which  brought  many  thousand  acres  into  compara 
tively  few  hands.  Puritan  influence  is  shown  in  the 
difference  in  the  administration  of  law,  thirteen  classes  of 
crime  being  punishable  by  death  in  the  eastern  division, 
and  none  in  West  Jersey,  which  did  not  permit  capital 
punishment  Differences  of  manners,  nomenclature, 
traditions  of  commerce,  and  legal  custom  are  traceable 
even  to-day,  and  Dutch  and  Scotch  imprints  remain  in 
Bergen  (now  Hudson)  and  Monmouth  counties,  as  evident 
as  the  old  English  inheritances  in  West  Jersey,  where 
farmers'  leases  to  this  hour  expire  on  Lady  Day,  25th 
March,  and  where  eggs  may  still  be  bought  by  the  score, 
as  in  old  Yorkshire.  In  East  Jersey,  the  town-meeting 
was  the  political  factor  to  be  reckoned  with  and  the  town 
the  unit  of  activity.  In  West  Jersey,  the  county  was 
the  unit,  and  the  resemblance  between  the  western 
province  and  Virginia  is  as  clear  as  that  between  East 
Jersey  and  the  Puritan  home  whence  came  its  people. 
William  Penn's  personal  influence  was  much  more  felt  in 
West  than  in  East  Jersey.  Many  a  time  Governor  Penn, 
in  the  brief  period  of  eighteen  months  which  rounded  out 
his  residence  at  his  "  palace  "  at  Pennsbury,  stopped  at 
Burlington  in  his  barge  on  his  way  up  and  down  the 
Delaware.  Sometimes  he  came  to  the  fairs,  which  were 
an  important  social  feature  of  the  day,  so  important  that 
when  Monthly  Meeting  fell  on  fair  day,  in  Burlington  or 
Salem,  it  was  adjourned  until  the  fair  was  over,  as  on 
"ye  4th  of  ye  8  mo.  1697,  Ordered  at  this  meeting  that 
our  next  Monthly  Meeting  be  deferred  one  week  longer 
than  the  usual  Day,  because  the  fair  falling  on  that  day 
ye  Meeting  should  be."  Semi-annual  fairs  were  held  in 
spring  and  autumn,  and  these  market  days  were  kept  up 
until  the  Revolution.  In  1729  they  became  an  abuse, 


CH.II          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  379 

and  the  Monthly  Meeting  at  Burlington  petitioned  the 
Assembly  to  remedy  their  evil  effects. 

William  Penn  was  in  England  during  the  culmination 
of  the  Keith  controversy,  but  his  advice  was  sought 
regarding  the  disturbances  of  Keith's  followers,  who  were 
organising  separate  meetings  at  the  time  of  his  second 
visit.  Their  doctrines  had  been  promulgated  by  Daniel 
Leeds  and  William  Bradford,  the  printers,  and  several 
prominent  men  had  joined  Thomas  Budd  in  secession. 
Another  element  occasionally  felt  was  the  "  mystic " 
society  at  Germantown  and  on  the  Wissahickon,  whose 
apostles  occasionally  came  into  meetings,  and  after  one 
invasion  at  Burlington,  ascended  the  Court  House  steps, 
and  from  there  harangued  the  people. 

The  social  life  of  the  Quakers  in  the  Jerseys  was 
unique.  The  prominent  Friends  in  both  colonies,  although 
chiefly  in  the  western,  were  Governors,  Councillors,  and 
members  of  Assembly.  They  were  great  planters,  and 
merchants  on  a  large  scale,  sending  their  vessels,  built  on 
the  Delaware,  to  China  and  the  West  Indies.  Perth 
Amboy  in  East  Jersey,  and  Cohansey  (Bridgeton)  and 
Burlington  in  West  Jersey,  were  the  ports  of  entry.  Great 
activity  began  before  the  end  of  the  century  in  the 
exchange  of  ministers  between  London  and  the  American 
colonies.  All  of  these  were  obliged  to  cross  New  Jersey 
on  their  travels  between  New  England  and  the  south. 
The  Wardells  and  Richard  Hartshorne,  at  Shrewsbury  and 
Middletown  respectively,  were  the  earliest  resident  Quaker 
ministers  of  whom  we  have  record.  Samuel  Jenings,  John 
Skein,1  Thomas  Olive,  all  of  them  Governors  ;  William 
Peachy,2  Thomas  Gardiner,  William  Cooper,  George 
Deacon,  Edward  Barton,  Elizabeth  Day,  Jane  Seaton, 

1  John  Skein,  born  in  Scotland,  at  Aberdeen.     Imprisoned  1676,  and  suffered 
distraint  for  fines  imposed  because  he  refused  to  give  bond  not  to  attend  meet 
ings  (Besse,  ii.  516).     Emigrated  to  West  Jersey  1678,  where  he  was  Governor 
for  two  years.     He  died  in  1687,  a  useful  and  much  respected  man.     A  minister 
with  an   "  edifying  testimony." — Smith,  History  of  New  Jersey,  1765. 

2  William  Peachy,  who,   says  Proud  (History  of  Pennsylvania,  i.  158),  with 
Thomas  Olive,  was  the  "  first  among  Friends  in  West  Jersey  who  had  a  public 
ministry."     He  was  from  London,  but  had  been  imprisoned  with  his  young  wife 
in  Bristol,   where  she  died.      He  arrived  in  West  Jersey  in  1677  on  the  Kent, 
was  elected  to  the  Assembly  in  1682,  and  died  in  1689  at  Burlington. 


38o   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

Mary  Smith  (widow  of  Daniel),  Peter  Andrews,  and 
Abraham  Farrington  were  all  early  preachers  of  Quakerism 
in  West  Jersey,  the  last  two  dying  in  England  on  religious 
visits  abroad. 

It  is  not  surprising  that  several  of  the  most  distinguished 
Quakers,  whose  influence  told  .greatly  in  both  Church  and 
State,  emigrated  to  America  just  before  or  immediately 
after  William  Penn,  and  were  all  from  the  neighbourhood 
of  Rickmansworth.  Thomas  Ellwood  appears  to  have 
been  untouched  by  the  spirit  of  emigration ;  but  his 
friends,  John  Archdale  and  Samuel  Jenings,  of  High 
Wycombe  and  Aylesbury  respectively,  left  an  indelible 
impress  upon  the  affairs  of  two  great  provinces. 

The  minute  from  their  home  meeting  of  Coleshill  for 
Samuel  Jenings  and  Ann,  his  wife,  and  their  children,  is 
dated  "26th  day  of  ye  3d.  mo.  1680,"  and  states  that 
they  "  have  lived  in  these  parts  many  years  ;  have  walked 
Conscientiously  and  honestly  Amongst  us  Agreeable  to 
ye  profession  and  testimony  of  Truth."  It  is  signed  by 
sixteen  men,  among  whom  are  the  names  of  Thomas 
Olive,  Thomas  Ellwood,  and  John  Archdale.  Samuel 
Jenings  came  out  in  the  official  capacity  of  Deputy- 
Governor  for  Edward  Byllynge,  who  at  first  declined  to 
relinquish  the  prerogative  of  government  along  with 
territorial  rights  to  purchasers.  Governor  Jenings 
reached  the  Delaware  in  the  late  summer  of  1680,  and 
six  weeks  after  sent  a  letter  addressed  to  William  Penn, 
Edward  Byllynge,  or  Gawen  Lawrie,  to  apprise  them  of 
his  safe  arrival,  and  to  convey  the  welcome  information 
that  the  duties  exacted  illegally  by  the  Governor  of  New 
York  had  been  removed.  He  wrote  : l 

"  DEAR  FRIENDS, — This  may  give  you  an  account  of  mine  and 
my  families  safe  arrival  in  New  Jersey,  with  all  the  rest  that  came 
with  us.  I  might  say  something  concerning  our  passage  at  sea, 
but  I  waive  it  for  want  of  time,  and  in  fine  may  observe  all  was 
well ;  for  which  I  bless  God ;  and  the  Lord  keep  us  all  sensible 
of  it,  with  the  rest  of  his  mercies  for  ever. 

"Dear  friends,  about  six  weeks  since,  we  arrived  in  the  Delaware 

1  Smith's  New  Je rsey,  p.  124. 


CH.II          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  381 

river,  where  I  expected  to  have  met  with  a  combat  in  the  denial 
of  customs.  In  our  passage  at  sea  I  had  communicated  to  all 
that  had  any  considerable  cargo  on  board  the  opinion  of  council 
concerning  any  illegal  demand  thereof,  with  what  else  I  thought 
might  be  for  their  information ;  which  thus  far  prevailed  that 
most  if  not  all  concerned,  seemed  resolved  to  deny  the  paying 
of  custom  here ;  having  paid  all  the  King's  duties  in  England. 
In  good  time  we  came  to  anchor  in  Delaware,  where  one,  Peter 
Alrick,  came  aboard,  and  brought  a  handsome  present  to  our 
commander,  and  sent  for  me  into  the  round-house,  where  they 
both  were,  and  Peter  told  me  he  had  nothing  to  say  to  us  relating 
to  customs ;  he  had  no  commission  for  it,  nor  did  he  know  of 
anybody  that  had ;  so  we  had  all  our  goods  safely  landed  after 
this  unexpected  easy  manner. 

"  In  pursuance  of  the  trust  committed  to  me  after  my  arrival, 
I  acquainted  those  nominated  in  the  commission  with  me  of  it ; 
but  in  a  short  time  after  I  received  your  letters,  giving  an  account 
of  a  new  grant  obtained,  wherein  the  customs  are  taken  off,  a 
free  port  confirmed  and  the  government  settled  on  Edward 
Byllynge ;  which,  I  doubt  not,  will  be  very  acceptable  to  every 
honest  man ;  but  as  yet  I  have  not  had  time  to  let  the  people  in 
general  know  it.  And  now,  seeing  the  ports  are  made  legally 
free,  and  the  government  settled,  I  would  not  have  anything 
remain  as  a  discouragement  to  planters.  Here  are  several  good 
and  convenient  settlements  already,  and  here  is  land  enough  and 
good  enough  for  many  more."  SAMUEL  JENINGS. 

"New  Jersey,  the  xyth  October  1680." 

Samuel  Jenings  took  up  land  and  settled  at  Burlington. 
The  following  year  he  called  together  the  first  West  Jersey 
Assembly,  and  agreed  with  them  upon  certain  fundamental 
points  of  government.  The  Assembly  dissolved  on  the 
28th  of  ninth  month,  having  passed  in  addition  thirty-six 
laws,  many  of  which  were  later  on  repealed.  The  tact  of 
Governor  Jenings,  who  was  thoroughly  acceptable  to  the 
settlers,  avoided  open  rupture,  and  quieted  the  prevalent 
discontent.  To  silence  the  protests  of  all  parties,  whose 
resentment  was  increasing  against  Byllynge,  Jenings  was 
chosen,  and  duly  elected  Governor  by  the  representatives 
of  the  people  in  the  Assembly  of  1683.  He  was  thus 
empowered  to  act  independently  of  Byllynge's  appointment. 
He  and  the  council  elected  at  the  same  time — all  of  them 
Quakers,  with  one  exception — gave  their  solemn  promise 


382    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

in  lieu  of  an  oath  of  office.1  The  Governor's  salary  was 
the  right  to  take  up  six  hundred  acres  of  land  above  the 
Falls  of  the  Delaware. 

When  the  provinces  were  united  under  one  Royal 
Governor,  in  the  person  of  Lord  Cornbury,  the  Queen's 
cousin,  who  arrived  in  1703,  Samuel  Jenings  was  elected 
Speaker  of  the  Assembly.  In  this  position  he  was  called 
upon  to  silence  the  voice  of  controversy,  the  Assembly 
supporting  him  loyally  in  his  valiant  opposition  to  the 
unjust  demands  of  the  brutal  and  licentious  governor. 
This  culminated  in  the  famous  remonstrance  of  the 
Assembly  of  April  5,  1707.  Repeatedly  stopped  in  his 
reading  of  the  paper  by  Lord  Cornbury's  ejaculations  of 
"Stop!"  "What's  that?"  etc.,  he  quietly  paused  and 
then  resumed,  with  dignity  repeating  what  he  had 
previously  read,  laying  greater  emphasis  than  before 
upon  the  points  which  he  desired  to  bring  out,  and 
quite  undaunted  by  the  evident  anger  of  Her  Majesty's 
representative : 

"We  cannot  but  be  uneasy,"  he  deliberately  read,  "when 
we  find  by  the  new  methods  of  government  our  liberties  and 
properties  so  much  shaken  that  no  man  can  say  he  is  master  of 
either,  but  holds  them  as  tenant  by  courtesy  and  at  will,  and 
may  be  stript  of  them  at  pleasure.  Liberty  is  too  valuable  a 
thing  to  be  easily  parted  with." 

Upon  the  departure  of  the  House,  Lord  Cornbury, 
with  emotion,  turned  to  those  about  him,  and  exclaimed, 
"  Jenings  has  impudence  enough  to  face  the  Devil ! " z 
The  reply  of  the  Assembly  to  the  Governor's  answer — 
which  concluded  with  the  words,  "  I  was  going  to  give 
you  some  wholesome  advice,  but  I  consider  it  will  be  but 
labour  lost,  and  therefore  shall  reserve  it  for  persons  who, 
I  hope,  will  make  a  right  use  of  it ! " — showed  their 
adherence  to  the  Quaker  customs  by  the  insertion  of  the 
following  note,  frequently  appended  to  other  official 
documents : 

"  Divers  of  the  members  of  this  Assembly  being  of  the  people 


1  Smith,  History  of  New  Jersey,  p.  164.  *  Ibid.,  p.  295. 


CH.  ii          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  383 

called  Quakers  do  assent  to  the  matter  and  substance,  but  make 
some  exception  to  the  stile." 

When  the  people  of  New  York  added  their  voice  in 
remonstrance  to  the  evil  proceedings  of  Cornbury,  the 
Queen  ordered  his  withdrawal. 

In  the  affairs  of  the  meeting  Samuel  Jenings  appears 
in  innumerable  capacities  as  a  church-officer.  During  the 
height  of  the  Keith  controversy  he  took  an  active  part, 
exhorting  to  wisdom  in  individual  cases ;  assisting  the 
Friends  in  Philadelphia  on  behalf  of  William  Stockdale 
and  Thomas  Fitzwater,  the  particular  objects  of  George 
Keith's  attacks ;  publishing  a  fair  setting  forth  in  defence 
of  the  Quakers  in  his  pamphlet,  known  as  "  The  State  of 
the  Case  Considered,"  etc.  ;  and  finally  in  the  latter  part 
of  1693  sailing  for  England  on  behalf  of  Friends  in 
America,  where  at  London,  together  with  Thomas  Duckett 
and  William  Walker,1  he  laid  the  true  facts  before  London 
Yearly  Meeting.  The  result  was  the  disownment  of  Keith 
by  the  Yearly  Meeting  of  London  in  1695,  following  the 
action  taken  at  Burlington  in  1692.  In  1702,  after 
George  Keith  returned  to  America  as  an  officer  of  the 
Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel  in  Foreign 
Parts,  he  appeared  at  Burlington  and  endeavoured  to 
draw  the  Quakers  into  controversy,  and  succeeded  in 
attaching  a  number  of  the  less  loyal  to  the  Church  of 
England.  The  new  arrivals  challenged  the  Quakers  to 
meet  them,  and  reply  to  their  charges  at  a  public  meeting 
in  the  town-house  at  Burlington,  which  the  Friends 
quietly  declined.  Soon  after,  the  clerical  gentlemen  went 
so  far  as  to  invade  the  Quaker  meeting,  this  being  one  of 
the  offences  so  often  attributed  to  the  Quakers  themselves. 
A  letter  from  the  rector  of  the  recently  founded  church  in 
that  place  to  George  Keith,  dated  New  York,  October  20, 
1705,  says :  ' 

"  Mr.  Sharpe  was  very  jealous  to  bring  ye  Quakers  to  stand  a 
tryal;  he  carried  one  of  ye  'Bombs'  (an  attack  published  at 
this  time)  into  their  meeting,  and  read  a  new  challenge  I  had 

1  The  latter  died  while  in  England. — Bowden,  History  of  Friends  in  America, 
P-  52- 


384    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

sent  them  to  answer  what  they  had  printed;  but  all  in  vain. 
Samuel  Jenings  stood  up  and  said,  '  Friends,  let's  call  upon  God.' 
Then  they  went  to  prayer,  and  so  their  meeting  broke  up." 

Samuel  Jenings  held  office  as  Speaker  of  the  Assembly 
until  the  year  before  his  death,  which  occurred  in  1709 
at  his  home,  "  Greenhill,"  in  Burlington,  and  he  was 
interred  in  the  Friends'  graveyard  in  that  place.  A  fine 
tribute  to  his  character  is  paid  by  the  historian  Smith, 
whose  father  knew  Governor  Jenings  well. 

"  He  was  early  an  approved  minister  among  (the  Quakers)," 
says  Smith,  "  and  so  continued  to  his  death.  Common  opinion, 
apt  to  limit  this  sphere  of  action,  will,  however,  allow  general 
rules  to  have  their  exceptions,  as  instances  now  and  then,  though 
perhaps  but  rarely,  occur,  where  variety  of  talents  have  united 
in  the  same  individual,  and  yet  not  interfered.  Such,  the  account 
of  those  times  (strip'd  of  the  local  uncertainties  of  faction  and 
party),  tell  us,  was  the  circumstance  with  regard  to  Jenings.  His 
authority,  founded  on  experienc'd  candour,  probity,  and  abilities, 
enlarged  opportunities,  rendered  him  not  in  one  capacity  or  in 
one  society  only,  generally  useful.  .  .  .  With  a  mind  form'd  to 
benevolence  and  acts  of  humanity,  he  was  a  friend  to  the  widow, 
the  fatherless,  and  the  unhappy.  Tender,  disinterested,  and 
with  great  opportunities,  [he]  left  but  a  small  estate.  Abhorring 
oppression  in  every  shape,  his  whole  conduct  discovered  a  will 
to  relieve  and  befriend  mankind,  far  above  the  littleness  of  party 
or  sinister  views.  His  sentiments  of  right  and  liberty  were  formed 
on  the  revolution  establishment,  a  plan  successfully  adapted  to 
the  improvement  of  a  new  country,  or  any  country.  He  was,  not 
withstanding  all  this,  sometimes  thought  stiff  and  impracticable, 
but  chiefly  on  account  of  his  political  attachments.  Yet  there 
were  instances  where  better  knowledge  of  his  principles,  and  the 
sincerity  with  which  he  acted,  totally  effaced  those  impressions, 
and  left  him  friends  where  none  were  expected.  Much  of  his 
time  .  .  .  was  long  devoted  to  the  publick  with  a  will  to  be 
useful.  West  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  and  New  Jersey,  after  the 
surrender,  for  near  twenty-eight  years  successively,  were  repeated 
witnesses  of  his  conduct  in  various  capacities.  He  studied  peace 
and  the  welfare  of  mankind.  .  .  .  He  just  lived  long  enough  to 
see  (the  country)  emerging  from  an  unpromising  state  of  litigation 
and  controversy  to  more  quiet  than  had  been  known  for  many 
years." 

He  remembered  his  old  friend  and  neighbour,  Thomas 


CH.  ii          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  385 

Ellwood,  in  England,  by  leaving  a  bequest  to  him  of 
twenty  pounds  to  buy  "  my  long  -  acquainted,  worthy, 
and  endeared  friend  a  gelding  or  otherwise  as  he  shall 
think  fit." 

Thomas  Olive  (or  Olliffe)  of  Wellingborough  in 
Northamptonshire,  was  a  convert  to  Quakerism  by  the 
preaching  of  William  Dewsbury  in  1655.  He  was 
imprisoned  in  1665  under  the  Conventicle  Act,  and  in 
1666  had  sixty  pounds  of  cloth  seized  and  taken  from 
him.1  He  came  out  to  the  Jerseys  as  a  London 
Commissioner  in  the  ship  Kent  in  1677,  and  was  the  first 
Speaker  of  the  Colonial  Assembly,  holding  office  several 
years.  In  1684  he  became  Governor.  While  Justice  of 
the  Peace  for  the  district  of  Burlington  he  gained  the  love 
and  esteem  of  all  his  countrymen. 

"He  had,"  says  Smith  the  historian,  "a  ready  method  of 
business,  often  doing  it  to  good  effect  in  the  seat  of  judgment 
on  the  stumps  in  his  meadows  ;  he  contrived  to  postpone  sudden 
complaints  until  cool  deliberation  had  shown  them  to  be  justly 
founded,  and  then  seldom  failed  for  accommodating  matters 
without  much  expense  to  the  parties." 

Thomas  Olive  died  in  1692? 

Too  much  emphasis  cannot  be  laid  upon  the  im 
portant  part  taken  in  the  political  affairs  of  New  Jersey 
by  the  Quakers  of  the  earlier  period.  Their  staunch 
integrity  and  courageous  defence  of  their  actions  in  every 
thing  that  involved  a  sense  of  duty  to  the  public,  is 
beyond  praise,  and  undoubtedly  was  an  important  factor 
in  forming  the  government  of  the  state  upon  present 
lines.  Three  Quaker  governors  have  been  named.  In 
May  1696  the  legislature  selected  as  King's  Attorney 
(Prosecutor  of  the  Pleas)  George  Deacon,  a  Quaker 
arrival  on  the  Willing  Mind,  who  came  to  the  Delaware 
in  the  winter  of  1677,  and  who  held  office  in  various 
capacities.  In  1696  Benjamin  Wheat8  served  in  the 

1  Besse,  Sufferings  of  the  Quakers,  i.  534-536. 

2  Thomas  Olive's  salary  as  Governor  was  £20  per  year  ! 

8  Benjamin  Wheat  with  another  Friend  furnished  the  handsomely  designed 
pine  table,  upon  which  the  meeting  at  Burlington  transacted  its  business,  and 
which  is  still  in  use. 

2  C 


386    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

same  position,  and  was  followed,  two  years  later,  by 
Thomas  Gardiner,  son  of  the  Thomas  Gardiner  at  whose 
house  the  early  meetings  were  held.  There  were  no 
regularly  admitted  lawyers  at  the  New  Jersey  Bar  before 
1702,  and  the  "Rules  of  the  Supreme  Court"  show  that 
from  1704  to  the  date  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
only  two  chief-justices,  out  of  eight  that  held  the  office, 
were  licensed  attorneys  of  the  province.1  Of  twenty-two 
associate  justices,  only  three  were  regularly  admitted,  and 
of  the  three,  two,  only  on  the  day  they  were  elevated  to 
the  bench  !  English  standards,  of  course,  governed  the 
practice  of  law,  and  the  Supreme  Court  was  modelled  on 
the  Court  of  Queen's  Bench,  and  set  up  in  1704.  Less 
concerned  with  the  technicalities  of  the  courts  than  with 
the  administration  of  substantial  justice,  the  old  Quaker 
idea  of  righteousness  in  dealing  with  rights  of  property 
owners  and  with  offenders  may  well  have  laid  the  founda 
tions  of  a  system  which  to-day  makes  "  Jersey  Justice  " 
proverbial  in  the  United  States. 

There  were  many  Quaker  Justices  of  the  Peace ; 
lenient  and  fair-minded  as  a  class,  these  occasionally 
meted  out  severe  punishments,  as  when  in  1682  Governor 
Jenings  and  Justices  Cripps  and  Stacey  ordered  a  runaway 
pair  who  added  lies  to  their  crime,  at  "  the  tenth  hour  in 
the  morning,"  to  be  "  whip'd  on  their  naked  bodies,"  the 
man  thirty  stripes  and  the  woman  thirty-five,"  he  "  paying 
the  ffees." 

In  East  Jersey,  marriages  had  been  regulated  accord 
ing  to  the  practice  of  the  Scotch  Kirk,  requiring  the 
publication  of  banns  three  times,  the  Governor's  licence, 
and  consent  of  parents.  Equally  stringent  in  West 
Jersey  were  the  marriage  customs,  where  the  House  made 
no  legislative  regulations,  but  where  the  Quaker  meetings 
saw  to  it  that  no  laxness  crept  in,  or  if  it  did,  that  it  met 
with  proper  punishment.  When  disagreements  occurred, 
reconciliation  was  recommended,  as  when,  some  time 
before  1694,  a  quarrelling  pair  were  summoned  before  the 
Quaker  justices  at  Burlington  and  asked  if  they  would  live 

1  F.  B.  Lee,  New  Jersey  as  Colony  and  State,  i.  312. 


CH.II          MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  387 

peaceably  together.  Mary  agreed  and  so  did  Thomas, 
he  stipulating  that  Mary  "  will  acknowledge  that  shee 
hath  scandalized  him  wrongfully."  To  this  the  woman 
consented,  adding  an  expression  eternally  feminine,  "  but 
saith  shee  will  not  own  that  shee  hath  told  lies  of  him  to 
her  knowledge  !  "  At  this  point  the  negotiations  naturally 
come  to  a  standstill.  "  But  after  some  good  admonitions 
from  ye  Bench,"  says  the  record,  "  they  both  p'mise  they 
will  forgett  and  never  mention  what  unkind  speeches  or 
Actions  have  formerly  past  betweene  them  Concerninge 
each  other." l 

After  the  Crown  took  over  the  government  in  1702, 
the  granting  of  marriage  licences  was  placed  in  the 
hands  of  the  Governor,  and  the  Church  of  England 
was  established.  The  nonconforming  members  of  the 
Assembly,  however,  for  a  long  time  opposed  the  passage 
of  England's  ecclesiastical  regulations  of  marriage. 

A  Women's  Yearly  Meeting  was  held  in  1681.  From 
this  time  on,  there  was  an  increasing  number  of  English 
Friends  in  the  ministry  who  crossed  the  ocean  to  visit 
the  American  Colonies.  James  Dickinson  paid  three 
visits  to  the  Jerseys — in  1691,  1696,  and  1714,  when, 
he  says,  "  some  of  the  meetings  were  the  largest  I  had 
ever  been  at.  People  flocked  so  to  them  that  several 
hundreds  were  forced  to  stand  without  doors,  the  meeting 
house  being  not  large  enough  to  contain  them."  At 
Burlington  Yearly  Meeting  "  the  Lord  owned  us  with 
His  living  presence,  and  we  had  a  glorious  season  to 
gether.  The  meeting  held  five  days  and  there  was  such 
a  concourse  of  people  that  we  held  two  meetings  at  once, 
one  in  the  Court  House  and  the  other  at  the  meeting 
house."  2  The  annual  meeting  of  ministers,  which  was 
held  at  the  house  of  Samuel  Jenings  in  Burlington,  was 
in  1698  attended  by  William  Ellis,  of  England,  who  is 
a  rare  instance  of  an  intelligent  visitor  who  took  notes 
on  the  spot — a  custom  which  we  may  well  wish  had  been 
followed  by  others.  Upon  this  deeply  interesting  occasion, 

1  F.  B.  Lee,  New  Jersey,  etc.  \.  324. 
8  Journal  of  J.  Dickinson. 


388    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

which  lasted  from  the  I7th  to  the  23rd  of  7  mo.  (O.S.), 
much  time  was  taken  up  in  the  careful  perusal  of  papers 
presented  for  publication  for  which  the  judgment  of  the 
meeting  was  sought,  and  without  whose  authority  their 
dissemination  was  impossible.  Pamphlet  wars  were  then 
the  fashion  upon  every  topic  of  public  interest,  and  every 
body  rushed  into  print  at  the  smallest  provocation.  At 
this  time  the  meeting  set  its  approval  upon  Caleb  Pusey's 
answer  to  Daniel  Leeds's  "  News  of  a  Trumpet  Sounding 
in  the  Wilderness,"  a  late  heretical  pamphlet  with  the 
usual  allegorical  title,  which  sympathised  with  George 
Keith.  The  Yearly  Meeting  which  immediately  followed 
at  the  same  place  stated,  in  its  epistle  to  London  : 

"  We  may  in  truth  say  through  the  large  mercy  and  the  wonder 
ful  goodness  of  our  God,  we  have  had  very  blessed  and  heavenly 
meetings.  The  presence  of  the  great  God  overshadowing  us, 
many  living  and  powerful  testimonies  were  delivered" 

All  the  letters  of  visiting  Friends  at  this  time  give 
evidence  of  great  growth  in  the  meetings.  Thomas 
Chalkley,  who  came  over  just  before,  mentions  a  very 
large  meeting  which  he  held  under  the  trees  at  Crosswicks, 
West  Jersey,  where  the  convincement  took  place  of 
Edward  Andrews,  who,  he  says,  was  "  mightily  reached," 
and  who  built  up  the  Society  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
Little  Egg  Harbour. 

The  Salem  Friends  at  the  end  of  the  seventeenth 
century  formed  a  flourishing  settlement,  with  a  large  and 
growing  meeting.  Into  this  more  southern  community  of 
the  Jerseys  there  arrived  in  the  year  1700  from  England, 
a  young  girl  of  only  eighteen,  who  came  out  to  occupy 
a  plantation  on  land  taken  up  some  years  previously  by 
her  father,  a  London  Quaker  merchant,  who  had  invested 
in  the  scheme  with  his  friend,  William  Penn.  After 
going  so  far  as  to  send  out  mechanics  to  build  him  a 
dwelling,  he  had,  for  reasons  now  unknown,  altered  his 
mind  and  remained  at  home.  His  daughter,  upon 
hearing  her  father's  proposal  to  sell  his  New  Jersey 
property,  felt  a  drawing  towards  America,  and  that  it 


CH.  ii         MEETINGS  AND  SOCIAL  LIFE  389 

was  her  duty  to  settle  there  herself.  This  feeling  was 
sympathised  with  and  shared  in  when,  with  much  emotion, 
she  made  it  known  in  family  conclave,  and  the  result  was 
that  John  Haddon  made  over  to  his  daughter  Elizabeth 
the  lands  which  he  had  taken  up.  Under  the  care  of 
a  widowed  friend  and  two  faithful  menservants,  this 
Quaker  daughter  of  wealth  came  to  the  unbroken 
wilderness,  followed  by  the  blessings  and  prayers  of  her 
God-fearing  family.  The  instance  is  unique  in  Quaker 
records.  In  the  pleasant  town  of  Haddonfield  to-day, 
pilgrimages  are  made  to  Haddon  Hall,  where,  after  a 
most  picturesque  courtship,  Elizabeth  married  John 
Estaugh,  and  where  forty  years  of  married  life  were 
spent.  John  Estaugh  died  on  a  preaching  tour  in 
the  Island  of  Tortola,  where  his  brick  tomb  may  still  be 
seen.  Of  Haddon  Hall,  only  the  old  brew-house  now 
remains,  with  its  latch-string  still  out,  as  when  Elizabeth 
there  made  her  many  simples  and  remedies  for  the  sick 
of  the  entire  settlement,  who  all  came  under  her  care. 
The  present  house  stands  where  the  original  stood,  burned 
to  the  ground  years  since  in  a  disastrous  fire.  But  the 
old  yews  which  she  planted  still  flourish  in  a  green  old 
age  in  the  garden  which  she  laid  out  so  long  ago. 

At  the  close  of  the  century,  in  1 699,  Philadelphia  had 
an  awful  visitation  of  yellow  fever,  which  broke  out  in 
June,  just  before  the  time  of  Yearly  Meeting,  and  in 
eight  weeks  had  carried  off  several  hundred  people.  The 
Friends  in  the  Jerseys  were  consulted  as  to  the  propriety 
of  postponing  the  meeting,  or  holding  it  elsewhere,  and 
the  subject  engaged  the  attention  of  the  meeting  of 
ministers  and  elders,  which  preceded  the  regular  meeting. 
Thomas  Story  and  his  companion  Roger  Gill  were 
present,  and  the  former  tells  us  : l  "  The  testimony  of  Truth 
went  generally  against  the  adjournment  or  suspension, 
and  the  Lord's  presence  was  greatly  with  us  to  the  end. 
Friends  were  generally  much  comforted  in  the  divine 
truth  and  the  fear  of  the  contagion  was  much  taken 
away."  It  was  at  this  Yearly  Meeting  that  Roger  Gill 

1  Life  of  Thomas  Story. 


390   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

prayed  that  "  if  the  Lord  would  accept  his  life  as  a 
sacrifice,  he  freely  offered  it  up  for  the  people."  He 
went  immediately  after  to  Burlington,  and  was  taken 
upon  his  return  with  the  dread  disease  from  which  he 
died  shortly  after,  and  the  journals  of  the  time  note  that 
the  ravages  of  the  fever  almost  immediately  ceased. 

Although  still  in  the  midst  of  political  disturbance — 
which,  however,  was  lessening  somewhat,  only  to  break 
out  on  the  coming  of  Lord  Cornbury — there  was  a 
remarkable  degree  of  prosperity  in  the  conduct  of  the 
Quaker  meetings.  They  appropriately  noted  in  the 
meeting  at  Burlington  in  1698,  in  a  minute  which 
fittingly  closes  the  century  : 

"  Whereas,  it  was  the  way  of  the  world  to  forget  God,  yet  the 
Lord  had  gathered  us,  His  people,  to  Himself,  that  we  could  not 
forget  Him  ;  for  though  we  came  poor  and  empty  together,  yet 
the  Lord  in  His  wisdom,  and  goodness,  and  love,  met  us  with 
a  full  hand,  to  comfort  and  strengthen  us,  that  we  might  not 
faint  in  our  minds,  but  be  renewed  in  our  strength." 


CHAPTER  III 

JOHN  WOOLMAN  :  THE  NEGROES 

THE  Friends  of  Pennsylvania  began  to  hold  annual 
meetings  immediately  after  their  arrival  with  William 
Penn,  but  as  a  Yearly  Meeting  was  already  well  organised 
by  the  Friends  of  the  Jerseys,  and  the  two  settlements  of 
Philadelphia  and  Burlington  were  but  twenty  miles  apart, 
it  was  agreed  in  1684  that  for  the  future,  the  meetings 
should  be  held  alternately  at  the  two  places — an  arrange 
ment  which  continued  for  seventy-five  years.  There  was 
an  agitation  in  1711  toward  changing  the  Yearly  Meeting 
permanently  to  Philadelphia,  but  the  time  had  not  come, 
and  the  minute  speaks  for  itself: 

"At  our  Monthly  Meeting  ye  7th  of  ye  nth  mo.  1711.  The 
minute  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  was  read  at  this  meeting  in  Relation 
to  Removing  of  ye  Yearly  Meeting  to  Philadelphia,  which  this 
meeting  are  all  in  general  against,  but  would  have  it  kept  in  its 
common  course  as  it  hath  been  used  &  in  ye  same  place  and  ye 
same  time  both  as  to  worship  &  Business  &  with  the  same 
authority  as  formerly." 

But  Philadelphia  was  rapidly  growing,  and  settlements 
in  Pennsylvania  and  Delaware  (then  the  "  Three  Lower 
Counties ")  drew  the  centre  of  the  Quaker  population  to 
the  south.  Agitation  was  revived  in  the  middle  of  the 
century,  and  in  9  mo.  1 760  the  Yearly  Meeting  removed 
permanently  to  Philadelphia.  The  change  from  the  sixth 
to  the  ninth  month  was  made  in  1755  ;  from  this  to  the 
fourth  month,  which  is  the  present  time,  in  1798. 

In  1701,  John  Richardson  came  to  America,  and 
upon  his  second  visit  in  1731,  he  records  his  satisfaction 


392    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

at  the  enormous  growth  of  the  meetings  in  the  interval. 
John  Fothergill's  three  visits  were  made  in  1706,  1721, 
and  1736^^6  last  continuing  for  three  years,  during  a 
period  of  great  sensitiveness  to  spiritual  teaching  throughout 
the  country.  In  1703  Samuel  Bownas,  although  but 
twenty-seven  years  of  age,  made  a  remarkable  impression 
upon  the  American  meetings.  Appearing  at  the  time 
when  George  Keith  was  preaching  in  the  Jerseys  as  a 
missionary  clergyman  of  the  Church  of  England,  he 
earnestly  attacked  the  latter's  attempts  to  lead  away  the 
Quakers,  often  with  marked  success.  Both  were  men  of 
great  ability.  They  became  pronounced  rivals,  and  did 
not  hesitate  to  denounce  each  other.  For  a  severe 
snub  administered  to  him  while  in  Maryland,  Keith  con 
trived  to  have  Bownas  seized  and  imprisoned  as  he  crossed 
the  Jerseys,  and  for  nearly  a  year  detained  upon  the 
accusation  that  he  "  spoke  against  the  Church  of  England  " 
— then  the  established  church  in  the  Jerseys  and  New 
York.  Upon  the  release  of  Bownas,  he  visited  nearly  all 
the  New  Jersey  meetings,  where  he  "  found  the  Truth 
growing." 

In  1704  all  "public  meeting-houses"  were  ordered 
recorded  in  the  archives  of  New  Jersey,  and  it  is  unfortunate 
that  the  list  of  deceased  Friends  since  the  settlement  of 
Burlington  sent  up  to  the  Yearly  Meeting  from  subordinate 
meetings  should  not  now  appear  to  exist.  In  this  year 
the  meeting  at  Burlington  issued  a  certificate  for  one 
hundred  and  twenty-two  of  its  members,  pursuant  of 
the  "  Act  of  Assembly  for  Settling  the  Militia  of  the 
Province,"  declaring  these  male  members  to  be  of  "  Ye 
Society  of  ye  people  called  Quakers,"  and  willing  to 
"receive  ye  benefit  of  ye  favour  expressed  to  ye  said 
People "  who,  for  conscience'  sake,  could  not  bear  arms 
and  were,  therefore,  exempted  from  service.  Rumours  of 
war  were  numerous.  Some  Spanish  and  Indian  runaways 
from  a  vessel  in  the  Delaware  roused  a  widespread  report 
that  the  French  were  at  Cohacksink.  Four  young  men,  in 
making  their  acknowledgment  to  the  meeting  at  Burlington 
naively  gave  their  reasons  for  taking  up  arms  in  defence  : 


CH.  m    JOHN  WOOLMAN:   THE  NEGROES      393 

"  That  it  seemed  best  for  those  that  had  guns  to  take  them, 
not  with  a  design  to  hurt,  much  less  to  kill,  man,  woman, 
or  child ;  but  we  thought  that  if  we  could  meet  these 
runaways,  the  sight  of  the  guns  might  fear  them  ! "  No 
less  a  person  than  James  Logan,  William  Penn's  secretary, 
had  shortly  before  made  an  acknowledgment  which  was 
read  at  the  Quarterly  Meeting  at  William  Biddle's  house 
in  i  mo.  1702,  for  going  with  the  Sheriff  and  an  armed 
posse  to  the  "  Reed  Islands  of  the  Delaware." 

All  through  the  French  and  Indian  wars  there  were 
sufferings  and  distraints  for  the  New  Jersey  Quakers  who 
were  one  with  their  Philadelphia  Friends  of  the  Yearly 
Meeting  in  the  action  taken  on  the  subject  of  war.  The 
results  of  disturbances  on  the  frontier  of  Pennsylvania 
came  closely  home  to  them  as  officials  of  the  Yearly 
Meeting,  and  met  with  sympathy  upon  their  part  The 
proportion  of  New  Jersey  Quakers  in  the  Yearly  Meeting 
may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  that  in  1730  and  for  years 
after,  as  many  as  thirty  or  thirty-five  representatives  were 
annually  sent  from  Burlington  Quarterly  Meeting  to  attend 
the  Yearly  Meeting. 

"  It  equally  concerns  men  in  every  age,"  wrote  John  Woolman, 
in  speaking  of  the  war  tax  of  1755,  "to  take  heed  to  their  own 
spirit.  ...  It  requires  great  self-denial  and  resignation  of  ourselves 
to  God  to  attain  that  state  wherein  we  can  freely  cease  from 
fighting  when  wrongfully  invaded,  if,  by  fighting,  there  were  a 
probability  of  overcoming  the  invaders.  Whoever  rightly  attains 
to  it  does  in  some  degree  feel  that  spirit  in  which  our  Redeemer 
gave  his  life  for  us." 

In  1757  (August)  orders  came  by  night  to  the  officers 
of  Burlington  County,  directing  them  to  draft  the  militia 
for  the  relief  of  the  English  at  Fort  William  Henry,  New 
York.  A  general  review  was  held,  and  soon  after,  three 
times  as  many  were  called  for,  to  be  in  readiness  at  any 
moment  for  marching  orders.  A  considerable  number  of 
the  young  men  who  were  Friends  were  thus  drafted  into 
the  army.  John  Woolman  reflects  upon  the  circumstance, 
and  sees  in  it  "  a  fresh  opportunity  to  see  and  consider 
the  advantage  of  living  in  the  real  substance  of  religion, 


394   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

where  practice  doth  harmonise  with  principle."  Some  of 
the  young  Quakers  left  home  and  remained  away  until 
the  trouble  was  over.  Others  agreed  to  go  as  soldiers. 
Still  others  expressed  a  "  tender  scruple  "  against  all  war, 
and  after  holding  council  with  John  Woolman,  who  en 
couraged  them  in  it,  informed  the  captain  that  they  could 
not  bear  arms  for  conscience'  sake,  nor  could  they  hire 
any  to  go  in  their  place,  being  "  resigned  as  to  the  event." 
They  finally  obtained  permission  to  return  home,  with  the 
warning  to  be  ready  when  called  upon  to  march.  They 
were  not  obliged  to  serve,  the  fort  being  taken  and 
destroyed  by  the  French.  In  April  1758  John  Woolman 
was  the  reluctant  host  of  a  soldier  who  was  quartered  upon 
him  for  lodging.  He  refused  the  payment  to  which  he 
was  entitled,  "  having  admitted  him,"  Woolman  told  the 
officer,  "  into  my  house  upon  a  passive  obedience  to 
authority.  I  was  on  horseback  when  he  spake  to  me, 
and  as  I  turned  from  him  he  said  he  was  obliged  to  me, 
to  which  I  said  nothing ;  but  thinking  on  the  expression, 
I  grew  uneasy,  and  afterwards,  being  near  where  he  lived, 
I  went  and  told  him  on  what  grounds  I  refused  taking 
pay  for  keeping  the  soldier." 

No  history  of  Quakerism  in  New  Jersey  can  be 
complete  without  due  regard  to  one  who  is  not  only  the 
most  conspicuous  of  his  own  community,  but  is  as  well  the 
best  known  American-born  Quaker  of  colonial  times. 

When  Charles  Lamb  recommended  his  readers  to 
"  get  the  writings  of  John  Woolman  by  heart,  and  so 
learn  to  love  the  Quakers,"  he  voiced  the  feelings  of  other 
cultured  and  sympathetic  minds  whose  experience  of  life 
nevertheless  differed  widely  from  anything  Quaker.  Men 
like  Henry  Crabbe  Robinson  and  William  Ellery  Channing 
— to  name  but  one  on  each  side  of  the  ocean — submitted 
to  the  spell  which  yet  lingers  about  the  pages  of  one  of  the 
most  pure  and  gentle  souls  that  ever  committed  its  tender 
thoughts  to  paper.  The  fifty-two  years  which  formed  the  life 
of  Woolman — he  was  born  at  Mount  Holly,  New  Jersey, 
in  August  1720,  and  died  in  York,  England,  7th  October 
1772 — were  an  important  period  in  the  world's  history, 


CH.  in    JOHN  WOOLMAN:   THE  NEGROES       395 

as  well  as  that  of  the  Quaker  Church.  The  philosopher 
may  trace  in  Woolman  the  culmination  of  that  intense 
sensitiveness  to  the  breathings  of  the  Divine  spirit  which 
marked  the  best  element  of  Quakerism  at  a  time  when  it 
was  seeking  diligently,  even  if  ineffectually,  to  perform  an 
impossible  task — to  live  a  life  of  perfect  service,  while 
withdrawn  from  contact  with  all  external  influences. 

Bred  most  simply  in  a  social  atmosphere  which  was, 
perhaps,  the  most  exclusively  conservative  of  any  within 
the  Quaker  pale,  the  simple  and  unlettered  youth  had 
opportunity  in  his  country  life  and  ample  leisure  to  allow 
a  reflective  spirit  and  an  intelligent  mind  to  follow  their 
own  bent  The  life  of  Woolman,  whose  love  of  mankind 
has  only  been  equalled  at  rare  intervals  in  the  world's 
history,  produced  two  very  important  results.  One  of 
these  was  due  to  his  personal  labours,  the  other,  with  less 
visible  immediate  effect,  is  only  to-day  reaching  the  wider 
world.  The  first  was  his  successful  effort  in  rousing  an 
anti-slavery  sentiment  and  promoting  the  abolition  move 
ment  ;  the  second,  the  wonderful  influence  exerted  in  the 
world  of  letters  and  religion  by  his  very  remarkable 
Journal  and  ethical  essays. 

The  number  of  slaves  held  in  the  province  of  New 
Jersey  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  was  large. 
In  one  Quarterly  Meeting  alone  there  were  eleven 
hundred  owned  by  Friends.  The  evil  had  increased 
with  the  growth  of  the  settlements  and  the  need  for 
more  servants.  Early  Quaker  movements  towards  aboli 
tion  instituted  by  Fox  in  Barbadoes,  by  Edmundson  in 
Maryland  and  Virginia,  by  the  Mennonites,  or  "  German 
Quakers,"  at  Germantown,  and  by  various  isolated  bodies 
of  Friends  in  the  more  enlightened  subordinate  meetings 
of  Pennsylvania  and  New  England,  had  all  been  without 
important  results  upon  the  main  body  of  comfortable  and 
prosperous  Friends  who  were  slave-holders.  It  was  not 
that  they  were  knowingly  cultivating  a  revolting  and 
indefensible  practice.  The  laws  of  Great  Britain  and  of 
the  colonies  countenanced  the  trade,  and  most  people 
were  persuaded  that  to  treat  a  slave  well,  and  to  teach 


396    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

him  the  doctrines  of  Christianity,  even  while  holding  him 
in  bondage,  was  the  kindest  method  possible  with  a 
member  of  the  inferior  race.  The  Quakers  would  seem 
to  have  been  the  first  people  able  to  see  through  the 
mists  of  social  prejudice,  and,  in  the  light  of  absolute 
justice,  to  discern  the  dangers  to  society  at  large,  which 
lay  at  the  root  of  a  prevalent  and  corrupt  social  custom. 

The  necessity  for  preparing  a  bill  of  sale  for  a  negress, 
during  Woolman's  apprenticeship,  in  the  year  1742,  first 
brought  home  with  a  shock  to  the  young  man's  mind  the 
true  meaning  of  the  situation.  From  that  moment  to  his 
dying  day,  his  life  had  but  one  object — to  free  the  slave. 
He  at  once  set  out,  like  a  wise  reformer,  to  discover  the 
true  facts,  and  in  tears  and  sorrow  were  they  revealed  to 
him.  In  1756  he  made  his  first  journey  to  the  South. 
This  was  followed  by  various  other  and  similar  journeys 
and  the  Indians  were  also  included  in  his  solicitude. 
The  Indian  conferences  at  Burlington  and  Easton  were 
held  in  the  summer  of  1758,  at  a  time  when  Woolman 
was  under  a  special  exercise  on  the  subject  of  negro 
bondage.  His  many  and  often  successful  private  efforts 
to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  the  negroes  had  attracted 
general  attention  among  the  Friends  to  the  subject. 
London  Yearly  Meeting  in  that  year  in  its  epistle 
condemned  the  unrighteous  traffic ;  and  New  England 
Yearly  Meeting  placed  upon  its  discipline  the  Query 
against  slavery : 

"Are  Friends  clear  of  importing  negroes,  or  buying  them 
when  imported,  and  do  they  use  those  well,  where  they  are 
possessed  by  inheritance  or  otherwise,  endeavouring  to  train 
them  up  in  principles  of  religion  ?  " 

The  culmination  of  all  of  Woolman's  earlier  efforts 
came  in  the  Yearly  Meeting  which  met  at  Philadelphia  in 
1758.  In  that  meeting  for  a  long  time  John  Woolman 
sat,  bowed  in  silence,  unmindful  of  other  important  matters 
which  claimed  the  attention  of  Friends.  When,  finally, 
the  subject  of  slavery  was  introduced,  and  advice  was 
given  to  "wait";  that  eventually  a  "way  would  be 


CH.  m    JOHN  WOOLMAN  :   THE  NEGROES      397 

opened  "  ;  and  procrastination  and  delay  were  the  order 
of  the  hour,  it  almost  seemed  to  the  agonized  servant  of 
the  Lord  that  the  meeting  was  engaged  in  a  justification 
of  slavery.  He  rose,  and  these  were  his  solemn  words  : l 

"  My  mind  is  led  to  consider  the  purity  of  the  Divine  Being, 
and  the  justice  of  His  judgments,  and  herein  my  soul  is  covered 
with  awfulness.  I  cannot  forbear  to  hint  of  some  cases  where 
people  have  not  been  treated  with  the  purity  of  justice,  and  the 
event  has  been  most  lamentable.  Many  slaves  on  this  continent 
are  oppressed,  and  their  cries  have  entered  into  the  ears  of 
the  Most  High.  Such  are  the  purity  and  certainty  of  His 
judgments,  that  he  cannot  be  partial  in  our  favour.  In  infinite 
love  and  goodness  he  hath  opened  our  understandings  from  one 
time  to  another,  concerning  our  duty  towards  these  people, 
and  it  is  not  a  time  for  delay.  Should  we  now  be  sensible  of 
what  he  requires  of  us,  and  through  respect  to  the  private 
interests  of  some  persons,  or  through  a  regard  to  some  friend 
ships  which  do  not  stand  upon  an  immutable  foundation, 
neglect  to  do  our  duty  in  firmness  and  constancy,  still  waiting 
for  some  extraordinary  means  to  bring  about  their  deliverance, 
God  may  by  terrible  things  in  righteousness  answer  us  in  this 
matter." 

This  appeal  moved  the  hearts  of  the  large  assembly  to 
a  sense  of  their  neglected  duty.  Sympathetic  discussion 
followed,  and  finally  the  Truth  triumphed  over  all  opposi 
tion,  and  the  first  committee  then  appointed  began  its 
actual  aggressive  work.  More  than  any  other  one  man, 
Woolman  aided  the  English-speaking  nations  to  throw 
off  the  disgrace  of  slavery ;  and  although  so  late  as  1800, 
there  were  still  12,442  slaves  held  in  New  Jersey,  of 
these,  thanks  to  the  labours  of  John  Woolman,  almost 
none  were  held  by  Friends.  Instead,  a  few  might  be 
found  in  each  of  the  colonies  who  were  received  into 
membership  with  the  Society,  notably  the  famous  sea- 
captain,  Paul  Cuffee,  of  Massachusetts. 

John  Woolman's  personal  influence  had  far-reaching 
social  and  moral  effects.  The  humility  and  self-abase 
ment  of  the  author  of  the  journal  are,  however,  so  great, 
that  the  reader  unfamiliar  with  contemporary  history 

1  Woolman's  Journal,  Whittier's  Edition,  1871,  p.  18. 


398    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

might  well  fail  to  understand  the  importance  of  the  move 
ments  there  recorded.  Fear  of  exceeding  the  standard 
of  extreme  humility  which  he  had  set  for  himself  has 
lost  to  us  from  his  Journal  any  reference  to  great  events 
in  which  he  was  an  actor.  Unfortunately,  no  mention  of 
himself  occurs  with  any  adequate  description  of  his  part 
in  affairs.  The  world  to-day  is  swamped  with  strenuous 
literature  in  which  the  personal  element  is  conspicuous. 
Possibly,  however,  had  this  quality  appeared  in  his  works, 
we  might  not  have  been  able,  with  Henry  Crabbe 
Robinson,  to  call  the  Journal  "  a  perfect  gem."  Its 
flavour  of  purity  and  grace  might  be  altogether  absent, 
had  he  given  us  more  of  himself.  As  it  is,  a  soul 
singularly  full  of  "  sweetness  and  light "  transfers  to  the 
printed  page  those  exquisite  moral  qualities  which  breathe 
forth  like  the  perfume  of  a  flower.  All  other  passions 
to  which  ordinary  mortals  are  prone  are  in  Wool  man 
swallowed  up  in  the  passion  of  love  to  mankind. 

Woolman's  ethical  essays  make  an  appeal  even  more 
appropriate  to  our  own  day  than  to  his  own.  Their 
scope  may  be  imagined  from  the  subjects  he  treats : 
"  On  Pure  Wisdom  and  Human  Policy,"  "  On  Labour," 
"On  Schools,"  "On  the  Right  Use  of  Outward  Gifts," 
"  On  the  True  Harmony  of  Mankind,"  "  On  the  Example 
of  Christ,"  "  On  Merchandizing,"  "  On  Divine  Admonitions," 
"  On  Loving  Our  Neighbours  as  Ourselves,"  "  On  a 
Sailor's  Life,"  "  A  Word  of  Remembrance  and  Caution 
to  the  Rich."  Do  not  these  seem  timely  topics  for  dis 
cussion  in  a  Christian  spirit  to-day  ?  "  To  labour,"  says 
Woolman,  "  for  an  establishment  in  Divine  love,  where 
the  mind  is  disentangled  from  the  power  of  darkness,  is 
the  great  business  of  man's  life." 

The  Journal  nowhere  betrays  any  selfish  solicitude  for 
his  own  well-being,  either  spiritually  or  physically,  and 
his  close  searchings  of  soul  are  only  as  he  feels  himself 
to  be  one  with  all  mankind.  In  the  essays  may  be 
clearly  discerned  a  singular  detachment  of  spirit  from 
everything  sordid  or  worldly.  He  wrote  as  one  who 
"  had  seen  in  the  Light  of  the  Lord  that  ...  he  that  is 


CH.  in    JOHN  WOOLMAN:   THE   NEGROES       399 

omnipotent  is  rising  up  to  judgment,  and  will  plead  the 
cause  of  the  oppressed,"  and  he  adds,  "  he  commanded  me 
to  open  the  Vision?  The  mystic  finds  expression  in  such 
passages  as  these,  and  the  following : 

"  I  have  frequently  found  a  necessity  to  stand  up,  when  the 
spring  of  the  ministry  was  low,  and  to  speak  from  the  necessity 
in  that  which  subjects  the  will  of  the  creature,  and  herein  I  was 
united  with  the  suffering  seed,  and  found  inward  sweetness  in 
these  mortifying  labours." 

A  desire  had  for  some  time  been  upon  Woolman's 
mind  to  visit  Friends  in  England,  and  in  1772  he  landed 
at  London,  and  straightway  made  haste  to  the  meeting 
of  ministers  and  elders,  which  had  then  been  sitting  for 
less  than  an  hour.  It  was  the  8th  of  June,  and  the  only 
thing  he  tells  us  of  his  soul-trying  experience  at  this  first 
appearance  among  his  English  brethren  is  that  "  his 
mind  was  humbly  contrite."  A  New  Jersey  Friend,  how 
ever,  was  the  medium  through  whom  Whittier  obtained 
the  actual  facts,  which  the  former  had  from  an  English 
Friend  who  could  verify  them.  The  vessel  reached 
London  on  the  fifth  day  of  the  week.  Coming  in  hastily 
and  unannounced,  the  stranger  Friend,  just  out  of  the 
vessel's  steerage  quarters,  with  a  correspondingly  dis 
hevelled  toilet,  which  was  in  itself  peculiar  in  its  undyed 
homespun  and  grey-white  beaver  hat,  naturally  created 
some  apprehension.  Even  the  certificate  which  he 
presented  as  a  credential  from  Friends  in  America  did 
not  suffice  to  quiet  the  alarm  ;  and  a  Friend  suggested 
that  possibly  Woolman's  submission  to  this  apprehended 
service  might  be  accepted,  and  the  stranger  now  feel 
at  liberty  to  return  to  his  home.  Greatly  affected  by 
this  reception,  John  Woolman  sat  silently  in  tears, 
awaiting  further  guidance.  After  a  time  he  rose  and 
respectfully  stated  that  he  could  not  feel  himself  released 
from  his  prospect  of  ministry,  yet  the  unity  of  Friends 
was  necessary,  and  this  being  withheld,  he  preferred  to 
support  himself.  He  stated  his  familiarity  with  his  trade, 
and  desired  employment  in  his  own  business. 

The  "  wise  simplicity  "  of  the  stranger  touched  Friends 


400   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

greatly,  and  when,  in  the  silence  that  followed,  Woolman 
again  rose  with  a  Divine  message  upon  his  lips,  all  hearts 
were  moved,  and  he  was  owned  and  confessed  by  his 
brethren,  and  passed  forth  to  his  brief  labours.  Four 
months  later,  at  York,  on  the  7th  of  October  1772,  John 
Woolman  died  of  smallpox.  Friends  everywhere  paid 
the  highest  tribute  to  his  character  and  labours,  his 
saintly  life  and  example.  His  Journal  is  a  classic,  not 
alone  for  Quakers,  but  for  all  the  world.  These  modern 
days,  with  the  search  for  Truth  in  the  abstract,  should 
be  even  more  sympathetic  than  his  own  to  the  teachings 
of  Woolman.  Students  of  religion,  of  philosophy,  and  of 
social  science  may  alike  find  in  him  inspiration  and  aid. 

"  For  since  those  miraculous  days 

When  marvellous  wonders  were  rife  ; 
When  the  blind  gaz'd  with  joy,  and  the  dumb  sang  with  praise, 

And  the  dead  were  restored  unto  life — 
I  know  not  of  one  whom  my  heart  could  allow 
More  worthy  the  name  of  Apostle  than  thou." 

BERNARD  BARTON, 

on  JOHN  WOOLMAN. 


CHAPTER    IV 

JOHN  WOOLMAN  :    THE  INDIANS 

HISTORY  shows  an  honourable  course  pursued  by  the 
settlers  in  the  difficult  problem  of  how  to  handle  the 
Indian.  Peaceable  under  friendly  rule,  he  became  a 
fiend  when  aroused  by  real  or  fancied  ill-treatment. 
Strict  justice  demanded  and  received  at  the  hands  of  the 
Quakers  full  remuneration  for  the  lands  obtained  from  the 
Indian  tribes  of  New  Jersey,  and  efforts  were  made  to 
Christianise  these  red  brethren  very  soon  after  the 
Quaker  settlements  began.  William  Penn  at  one  time 
held  a  theory  that  the  Indians  belonged  to  the  Ten  Lost 
Tribes  of  Israel.  Samuel  Smith,  the  historian,  thought 
the  idea  a  delightful  solution  of  a  difficult  problem  ;  and 
Elias  Boudinot's  Star  of  the  West  elaborates  it  further. 
However  that  may  be,  the  Indian  in  the  seventeenth 
century  was  a  very  present  menace  to  safety,  and  the 
Quakers  adopted  the  wise  course. 

The  tribe  of  the  Delaware  or  Lenni-Lenape  Indians 
who  were  scattered  throughout  the  Jerseys,  although  at 
no  time  very  numerous,  were  frequently  called  into  council 
by  the  Quakers.  Confused  by  the  dissensions  among 
other  Christian  bodies  and  unable  to  comprehend  an 
altruistic  faith,  the  Indians  had  yet  a  crude  system  of 
justice  among  themselves,  and  it  is  quite  possible  that  the 
absence  of  complicated  machinery,  combined  with  the 
evident  spirit  of  justice  conspicuous  among  the  Quakers, 
obtained  for  the  latter  a  better  hold  on  the  savage  nature 
than  was  the  case  with  other  religious  denominations.  In 
any  case,  the  control  was  not  very  permanent,  and  the 

401  2  D 


402   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

missionary  efforts  of  the  Quakers  were  only  a  degree  less 
unorganised  than  had  been  those  of  the  Dutch  and 
Swedes  before  them.  The  quarter-century  from  the 
Dutch  cession  to  the  English  until  the  surrender  of  the 
government  of  the  united  provinces  to  the  Crown  in  1702, 
covers  the  period  when  the  intercourse  between  the  whites 
and  red  men  was  most  marked.  This  was  chiefly  for 
purposes  of  trade.  New  Jersey  enjoyed  greater  freedom 
from  Indian  disturbances  and  outbreaks  of  war  than  other 
colonies.  In  the  purchase  of  lands,  all  titles  had  to  be 
cleared  of  Indian  ownership  in  both  the  Jerseys.  Thus 
the  Indian  claims  had  been  nearly  or  quite  extinguished 
by  the  period  of  the  Revolution.  At  no  time  was  the 
Indian  on  a  political  equality  with  the  white  man, 
although  West  Jersey  Quaker  equity  permitted  a  mixed 
jury  of  Indians  and  English  when  the  interests  of  the 
former  were  involved.  The  Indian,  despite  certain 
benevolent  enactments  of  the  Legislature,  remained  in  a 
position  of  servitude,  cut  off  from  any  industrial  privileges 
or  rights.  Severe  penalties  were  laid  upon  any  persons 
outside  of  the  province  of  East  Jersey  who  traded  with  an 
Indian  ; l  while  in  West  Jersey,  a  policy  of  indifference 
left  the  helpless  savage  largely  to  himself.  The  Quakers, 
however,  continued  throughout  the  colonial  period  to  hold 
meetings  for  the  Indians,  and  set  aside  certain  portions  of 
their  meeting-houses  for  Indians  and  negroes,  both  of 
whom  were  held  as  slaves.  The  wilder  nature  of  the 
American  Indian,  however,  prevented  satisfactory  domestic 
service.  The  interesting  Indian  conference  at  Burlington 
in  the  late  summer  of  1758  was  followed  shortly  after  by 
a  very  large  and  important  Indian  conference  of  the  Six 
Nations  at  Easton,  Pennsylvania,  on  the  upper  Delaware. 
The  Governors  of  both  the  provinces,  together  with  the  well- 
known  Indian  interpreter,  Conrad  Wieser,  and  others  were 
present.  At  this  time  deeds  were  obtained  by  which  the 
Indians,  for  the  sum  of  one  thousand  pounds,  surrendered  all 
claims  on  lands  in  New  Jersey  with  the  exception  of  a  small 
reservation.  This — a  matter  both  of  charity  and  pro- 

1  F.  B.  Lee,  New  Jersey  as  Colony  and  State,  i.  69. 


CH.  iv      JOHN  WOOLMAN:  THE   INDIANS        403 

tection,  the  first  Indian  reservation  ever  established  in 
the  United  States  —  was  located  at  "  Edgepelick "  or 
Brotherton  (now  Indian  Mills),  among  the  pine  barrens 
of  Burlington  County.  Here  the  Indians  of  New  Jersey 
were  settled  on  three  thousand  acres  which  maintained 
them  and  their  descendants  until  1802,  when  they  were 
transported,  first  to  New  York  State,  then  to  Green  Bay, 
Wisconsin,  and  finally,  in  1832,  to  Indian  Territory.  At 
this  time  the  New  Jersey  legislature,  for  the  sum  of  two 
thousand  dollars,  purchased  the  remnant  of  land,  and 
thus,  with  a  measure  of  justice,  obtained  clear  title  to  the 
entire  province. 

Just  before  this  reservation  was  established,  Samuel 
Smith,  for  years  Treasurer  of  the  province  and  a  leading 
Quaker,  had  drawn  up  a  Constitution  (1757)  for  the 
"  New  Jersey  Association  for  Helping  the  Indians  " — an 
organisation  exclusively  Quaker.  It  aided  the  Brotherton 
Indians  substantially,  and  did  effective  service  in  a  field 
in  which  Quaker  philanthropy  has  always  been  pro 
minent  A  good  example  of  the  cordial  relations  between 
English  and  Indian  in  a  Quaker  community  is  described 
in  the  account  of  the  death  of  King  Ockanickon,  at 
Burlington  in  I68I.1  The  old  chief,  on  his  death-bed, 
sent  for  his  nephew,  lahkursoe,  and  addressing  him  as 
"  Brother's  Son,"  told  him  of  his  selection  as  King  in 
succession.  "  This  day,"  said  the  dying  man,  "  I  deliver 
my  heart  into  your  bosom.  I  would  have  you  love  what 
is  good,  and  keep  good  company.  Be  plain  and  fair  with 
all,  Indians  and  Christians."  Thomas  Budd,  one  of  the 
proprietors,  was  present,  and  listened  to  the  exhortation 
of  the  old  man  with  emotion.  After  he  had  continued 
for  some  time  until  too  exhausted  to  speak  further, 
Thomas  Budd  took  the  opportunity  to  remark  that  there 
was  a  great  God,  who  created  all  things  ;  that  He  gave 
man  understanding  of  what  was  good  and  bad,  and  after 
this  life  rewarded  the  good  with  blessings,  and  the  bad 
according  to  their  doings.  Ockanickon  replied,  "  It  is 
very  true,  it  is  so.  There  are  two  ways,  a  broad  and  a 

1  Smith,  History  of  New  Jcricy,  pp.  148-150. 


404    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

straight  way  ;  there  are  two  paths,  a  broad  and  a  straight 
path.  The  worst  and  the  greatest  go  in  the  broad,  the 
best  and  fewest  in  the  straight  path."  The  old  chief  died 
shortly  after,  and  was  attended  to  his  grave  in  the  Friends' 
graveyard  in  Burlington  with  great  solemnity  by  a  large 
gathering  of  silent  Indians,  and  by  the  English  settlers  to 
whom  he  had  always  been  a  true  friend. 

A  long  journey  to  the  Susquehanna  to  visit  the  Indians 
at  Wehaloosing  was  undertaken  by  John  Woolman  with 
one  companion  in  1763.  To  go  was  to  take  his  life  in 
his  hands.  He  set  out  in  May  of  that  year,  and  the 
quaint  narrative  gives  us  glimpses  of  the  dangers  by 
the  way.  From  the  outset  Woolman  underwent  much 
spiritual  travail.  He  even  disregarded  the  friendly  warn 
ing  of  a  deputation  of  Philadelphia  Friends  who  arrived 
at  Mount  Holly  late  on  the  night  before  the  journey. 
An  express  rider  had  reached  Philadelphia,  with  word  of 
an  uprising  at  Pittsburg,  where  the  Indians  were  on  the 
warpath,  and  had  slain  some  of  the  English.  Certain 
elderly  Friends  in  Philadelphia  thought  it  right  to  give 
Woolman  a  word  of  warning,  and  sent. an  able-bodied 
deputation  post-haste.  Every  one  in  the  town  was  abed 
and  asleep  when  they  arrived,  and  Woolman  had  already 
taken  leave  of  his  neighbours.  They  rode  to  the  tavern, 
and  despatched  a  messenger  to  call  Woolman  from  his 
bed.  He  appeared  at  once,  received  the  message,  and 
returned  to  bed  without  telling  his  wife  until  next 
morning,  when,  he  writes,  she  was  greatly  distressed  at 
the  news,  and  they  had  "  an  humbling  time."  Never 
theless,  so  great  was  his  assurance  of  protection,  that  he 
departed  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord.  Israel  and  John 
Pemberton  set  him  on  his  way  to  his  friend  Samuel 
Foulke's  in  Bucks  County,  Pennsylvania,  where  he  joined 
four  Indians — a  man  and  three  women — who  were  return 
ing  to  the  Wyoming  Valley,  after  a  business  trip  East, 
and  who  had  agreed  to  act  as  guides. 

At  this  point,  Woolman  met  another  test.     He  writes  : 

"  Here  my  friend  Benjamin  Parvin  met  me,  and  proposed 
joining  me  as  a  companion — we  had  before  exchanged  some 


CH.IV      JOHN   WOOLMAN:   THE   INDIANS        405 

letters  on  the  subject, — and  now  I  had  a  sharp  trial  on  his 
account.  As  the  journey  appeared  perilous,  I  thought  if  he 
went  chiefly  to  bear  me  company,  and  we  should  be  taken 
captive,  my  having  been  the  means  of  drawing  him  into  these 
difficulties  would  add  to  my  own  afflictions.  So  I  told  him  my 
mind  freely,  and  let  him  know  I  was  resigned  to  go  alone.  But 
after  all,  if  he  really  believed  it  his  duty  to  go  on,  I  believed  his 
company  would  be  very  comfortable  to  me.  It  was  indeed  a  time 
of  deep  exercise,  and  Benjamin  appeared  to  be  so  fastened  to  the 
visit  that  he  could  not  be  easy  to  leave  me.  So  we  went  on." 

They  soon  struck  into  the  wilderness,  and  their  camp 
the  first  night  was  pitched  upon  the  banks  of  the  Lehigh, 
in  the  Blue  Ridge  Mountains.  Walking  about  at  sunset, 
Woolman  reflected  upon  the  horrors  of  war,  whether 
among  these  children  of  the  woods  or  civilised  nations. 
Upon  the  sides  of  the  great  forest  trees,  peeled  for  the 
purpose,  were  drawn  in  red  and  black  paint  rude  repre 
sentations  of  Indians  on  the  warpath,  going  and  returning 
from  battle,  with  others  suffering  horrid  deaths.  They 
were  on  a  familiar  Indian  trail,  often  used  by  the  savage 
warriors,  and  as  Woolman  studied  these  fierce  Indian 
histories,  his  soul  was  moved  to  reflect  on  the  afflictions 
which  "  a  fierce,  proud  spirit  produceth  in  the  world."  He 
meditated  on  their  fatigues  in  hard  mountain  travel ;  on 
their  misery  and  distress  when  wounded  far  from  home ; 
on  their  unnecessary  bruises  and  weariness  in  thus  chasing 
one  another  over  rock  and  stream ;  on  the  restless, 
unquiet  mind  of  all  those  who  live  in  the  spirit  of  war 
and  hatred  ;  and  on  the  inheritance  transmitted  to  their 
children, — and  he  yearned  to  tell  the  whole  human  race 
the  message  of  peace  and  love  which  he  so  fully  believed 
was  his.  The  next  rainy  day,  as  he  sat  in  his  tent,  he 
was  led  to  reflect  upon  the  nature  of  the  exercises  which 
attended  him. 

"  Love  was  the  first  motion,  and  thence  arose  a  concern  to 
spend  some  time  with  the  Indians,  that  I  might  feel  and  under 
stand  their  life  and  the  spirit  they  live  in,  if  haply  I  might 
receive  some  instruction  from  them,  or  they  might  be  in  any 
degree  helped  forward  by  my  following  the  leadings  of  Truth 
among  them." 


406    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

The  dangers  of  the  way  increased.  One  Indian  with 
whom  Woolman  talked,  produced  a  tomahawk  which  he 
had  kept  concealed  under  his  coat.  He  made  no  use  of  it, 
however,  and  sat  down  to  a  friendly  pipe,  when  conversation 
became  general.  The  hatchet,  Woolman  said,  had  a  very 
"  disagreeable  appearance,"  but  it  was  only  intended  for 
readiness  in  case  of  attack.  On  June  17  they  reached 
their  destination,  and  as  the  afternoon  shadows  stretched 
over  the  mountains,  the  first  person  whom  they  saw  was  a 
modest  old  Indian  woman,  with  a  Bible  in  her  hand,  who 
addressed  the  guide,  and  then  the  strangers,  telling  them 
she  had  heard  of  their  coming.  This  rejoiced  their  hearts, 
and  they  sat  on  a  log  while  the  conch-shell  was  blown  to 
call  the  people  together.  Going  into  a  house  near  the 
town,  they  found  some  sixty  persons  awaiting  them  in 
silence.  Woolman  addressed  them,  and  a  few  interpreted 
for  others,  and  he  greeted  them  from  their  white  brethren, 
nafvely  showing  these  dark  savages  his  certificate  from 
the  Monthly  Meeting,  which  he  endeavoured  to  explain. 
The  difficulties  of  the  Delaware  tongue  increased  his 
labours,  and  as  the  days  went  on,  and  the  spirit  of  good 
will  was  evident,  he  frequently  dispensed  altogether  with 
an  interpreter.  Once,  feeling  his  mind  covered  with  the 
spirit  of  prayer,  he  assured  the  interpreters  that  if  he 
prayed  aright,  God  would  hear  him  without  their  aid, 
and  the  "  meeting  ended  with  a  degree  of  divine  love." 
An  old  Indian  named  Papunehang — a  "  tender  man," 
says  Woolman — appreciated  the  spirit  and  atmosphere  of 
the  meeting,  even  if  he  did  not  comprehend  the  words, 
telling  the  interpreter  afterwards,  "  I  love  to  feel  where 
words  come  from." 

The  little  town  of  forty  houses,  the  largest  thirty  feet 
long  and  eighteen  feet  wide,  standing  compactly  together 
for  protection,  received  the  care  and  solicitude  of  John 
Woolman  for  the  remainder  of  his  stay.  On  the  2Oth  of 
June  he  felt  at  liberty  to  return  home,  which  he  reached 
by  the  end  of  the  month.  Thankfulness  at  having 
accomplished  his  task  and  finding  his  family  well  caused 
him  to  check  his  joy,  lest  the  feeling  might  seem  selfish 


CH.IV      JOHN   WOOLMAN:    THE   INDIANS        407 

in  being  "  glad  overmuch "  !     A  minute   stands   on   the 
books  of  his  meeting  : 

"  ist  of  8  mo.  1763.  Our  friend  John  Woolman  being  re 
turned  from  his  visit  to  some  religiously  disposed  Indians  up 
Susquehannah,  informed  the  last  meeting  that  he  was  treated 
kindly,  and  had  satisfaction  in  his  visit." 

Burlington,  headquarters  of  Quakerism  in  New  Jersey, 
was  but  five  years  old  when  the  Assembly  of  1682  passed 
an  act  "to  encourage  learning  for  the  better  education  of 
youth." 

This  act  set  aside  a  valuable  tract  of  land  in  the 
Delaware  opposite  Burlington  known  as  Matiniconk 
Island,  to  "remain  to  and  for  the  use  of  the  town  of 
Burlington  ...  for  the  maintaining  of  a  school  for  the 
education  of  youth." 

The  revenues  from  a  part  of  this  land,  cared  for  by  a 
committee  known  as  the  "  Island  Managers,"  are  still 
devoted  to  the  original  purpose.  This  is  probably  the 
oldest  trust  fund  of  an  educational  character  now  existing 
in  the  United  States. 

Thomas  Budd,  one  of  the  most  prominent  Quakers  of 
the  time,  and  author  of  an  interesting  pamphlet,  Good 
Order  Established  in  Pennsylvania  and  West  New 
Jersey,  in  a  comprehensive  plan  of  education  which  was 
largely  adopted,  urged  compulsory  education  at  the 
"  publick  Schools  "  for  a  period  of  seven  years.  "  Schools 
should  be  set  up  in  all  towns  and  cities  with  persons  of 
known  honesty,  skill,  and  understanding,  chosen  by  the 
Governor  and  Assembly,  to  teach  in  them."  He  would 
have  the  children  taught  "true  English  and  Latin  .  .  . 
and  fair  writing,  arithmetic,  and  book-keeping." 

The  first  mention  in  the  meeting  minutes  of  a  school 
for  Friends  occurs  in  a  minute  of  the  Monthly  Meeting 
of  Burlington  for  "  7th  of  I  ith  mo.  1705." 

"It  is  the  request  of  some  Friends  of  Burlington  to  this 
meeting  that  they  may  have  the  privilege  of  allowing  a  school  to 
be  kept  in  this  meeting-house  in  •  Burlington,  which  request  is 
answered  by  this  meeting." 


408    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

Schools  were  speedily  set  up  in  the  country  neighbour 
hoods  of  the  adjoining  Quaker  counties,  being  often  held 
in  the  meeting-houses,  and  while  no  high  degree  of  learning 
was  reached,  a  fair  average  for  the  day  was  maintained, 
with  the  exception  of  certain  isolated  settlements,  where 
both  educational  and  religious  interests  suffered  greatly. 
That  a  high  standard  of  intellectual  attainment  was  reached 
by  the  more  cultivated  Quakers  may  at  once  be  perceived 
when  we  recall  the  evidences  of  wide  reading  and  liberal 
views  shown  in  the  correspondence  and  literary  work  of  the 
leading  Quakers  of  the  early  eighteenth  century.  Closely 
in  touch  with  the  activities  of  the  Society  in  religious 
matters,  they  maintained  with  England  a  lively  corre 
spondence,  both  with  the  leading  Friends  and  some  of  the 
literary  men  of  the  day  in  London.  Among  these  were 
the  Morrises,  Smiths,  Kinseys,  Coxes,  and  Dillwyns,  of 
Burlington,  which  always  maintained  its  position  as  the 
chief  town  and  centre  of  culture  in  the  Jerseys.  The 
Yearly  Meeting  had  been  transferred  to  Philadelphia 
when  the  Quaker  revival  of  learning  came  at  the  end 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  War  of  the  Revolution 
startled  the  Friends  into  an  appreciation  of  their  pre 
carious  position.  Shutting  themselves  up  within  their 
defensive  walls  of  discipline  in  the  effort  to  strengthen 
themselves,  they  disowned  all  offenders  against  the 
sentiment  of  conservatism  urged  by  the  newly  created 
"  Meeting  for  Sufferings,"  and  began  to  teach  a  "  guarded 
education." 

In  1720  we  find  the  meetings  in  correspondence  with 
all  the  meetings  at  home  and  abroad,  and  still  growing  in 
numbers,  although  more  slowly.  Some  of  the  Friends 
of  the  second  generation  had  begun  that  movement  to 
the  lands  in  the  West  which  later  became  so  great ;  and 
when,  in  174.2,  Edmund  Peckover  attended  Burlington 
Yearly  Meeting,  he  noted  that  while  not  many  who  had 
started  West  had  been  of  "  much  note,"  when  arrived 
there  they  developed  greatly  in  a  spiritual  sense,  as  they 
were  thrown  more  upon  their  own  resources,  and  promised 
to  build  up  good  and  lively  meetings.  The  list  is  a  long 


CH.IV      JOHN   WOOLMAN:    THE   INDIANS        409 

one  of  those  who  came  to  refresh  their  American  brethren 
from  the  old  home,  but  there  were  already  growing  up 
within  the  circle  of  the  meetings  certain  ultra-conservative 
tendencies  which  were  detrimental  to  the  best  spiritual 
growth. 

The  following  very  interesting  remarks  stand  appended 
to  a  minute  of  the  Meeting  of  Ministers  and  Elders,  of 
which  John  Woolman  was  Clerk,  for  Burlington  and 
Chesterfield  Monthly  Meetings,  under  date  five  years 
before  his  death.  In  the  absence  of  statistics  for  that 
period,  the  list  he  gives  is  valuable,  and  is  our  only  record 
of  these  officers  of  the  meeting.  The  writer's  comment 
was  not  intended  for  public  perusal,  but  was  a  simple 
expression  of  his  feelings  on  making  the  list. 


LIST  OF  MINISTERS  AND  ELDERS  OF  BURLINGTON  QUARTERLY 
MEETING,  DATED  2  MO.  22nd,  1767. 


1.  John  Sykes 

2.  Joannah  Sykes 

3.  Josiah  Foster 

4.  John  Butkher 

5.  Mary  Bunting 

6.  Samuel  Sattertwaite 

7.  Thomas  Buzby 

8.  William  Morris 

9.  Daniel  Smith 

10.  Joseph  Burr 

11.  Jane  Burr 

12.  Jacob  Andrews 

13.  Josiah  White 

14.  Daniel  Doughty 

1 5.  Edith  Doughty 

1 6.  Joseph  Noble 

17.  Edward  Cathrel 

1 8.  Rachel  Cathrel 

19.  Elizabeth  Woolman 

20.  Elizabeth  Bordon 


21.  Katherine  Kalender 

22.  Ebenezer  Mot 

23.  William  Lowrie 

24.  Benjamin  Field 

25.  Edward  Whitcraft 

26.  Anthony  Benezet 

27.  Joyce  Benezet 

28.  Sarah  Newbold 

29.  Hannah  Bickerdike 

30.  Elizabeth  Shinn 

31.  John  Smith 

32.  Peter  Worral 

33.  Susannah  Worral 

34.  Benjamin  Jones 

35.  Elizabeth  Jones 

36.  Thomas  Middleton 

37.  Patience  Middleton 

38.  Elizabeth  Smith 

39.  Mary  Brown 

40.  Jane  Smith 


41.  Sarah  English 

42.  Amos  Middleton 

43.  Samuel  Worth 

44.  Joseph  Horner 

45.  Samuel  Gaunt 

46.  Meribeth  Fowler 

47.  Anthony  Sykes 

48.  Peter  Harvey 

49.  Mary  Harvey 

50.  Mary  Buzby 

51.  John  Sleeper 

52.  Caleb  Carr 

53.  Katherine  Wetheril 

54.  Asher  Woolman 

55.  Esther  Atkinson 

56.  Elizabeth  Hatkinson 

57.  Sarah  Woolman 

58.  Abner  Woolman 

59.  John  Woolman 

60.  William  Jones 


"The  22,  2  mo.  1767  this  list  was  entered  in  This  Book  and 
the  persons  above  named  are,  I  believe,  now  living.  As,  looking 
over  the  minutes  made  by  persons  who  have  put  off  this  Body, 
hath  sometimes  revived  in  me  a  thought  how  ages  pass  away ;  so 
this  list  may  possibly  revive  a  like  thought  in  some  when  I  and 
the  rest  of  the  persons  above  named  are  entered  in  another  state 
of  Being.  The  Lord  who  was  the  guide  of  my  Youth  hath  in 
Tender  mercies  helped  me  hitherto.  He  hath  healed  me  of 


410   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  iv 

wounds  !  He  hath  helped  me  out  of  grievous  entanglements ! 
He  remains  to  be  the  strength  of  my  life,  to  whom  I  desire  to 
devote  myself  in  Time  and  Eternity.  JOHN  WOOLMAN." 

The  period  when  John  Woolman  was  most  engaged 
in  the  ministry  is  a  striking  one  in  the  history  of  the 
Church.  Social  and  religious  conditions  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic  were  undergoing  great  changes.  As  a  rule, 
the  Quakers,  although  perhaps  unconsciously,  felt  the 
influences  pervading  all  classes  of  society  ;  and  the  fresh 
breath  of  what  has  since  been  known  as  the  "  Great 
Awakening"  swept  even  into  the  quiet  atmosphere  of  the 
Quaker  meeting.  One  of  the  great  leaders  among  the 
English  Friends  was  Samuel  Fothergill,  who  followed  a 
few  years  later  directly  in  the  footsteps  of  Whitefield. 
The  latter,  in  1739,  passed  like  a  ghostly  whirlwind  over 
the  Jerseys,  holding  meetings  in  the  open  air,  and  on  the 
steps  of  the  Court  House  in  Burlington.  Not  once,  but 
many  times,  did  the  strange  preacher  vehemently  exhort 
his  hearers  to  a  holier  life,  and  many  were  his  converts. 
His  ministrations  could  not  have  been  without  a  certain 
influence  upon  the  Society  of  Friends,  and  indeed,  through 
his  indefatigable  efforts,  there  were  many  converts  to 
Methodism,  albeit  Whitefield  was  no  longer  a  follower 
of  Wesley. 

John  Woolman  was  a  youth  of  eighteen  at  the  time  of 
Whitefield's  first  visit,  and  the  religious  excitement  in  the 
very  air  must  have  told  upon  him.  Be  that  as  it  may,  he 
very  soon  became  the  most  striking  figure  among  the 
Quakers  of  New  Jersey,  or,  indeed,  of  America.  Just  at 
the  time  when,  with  his  highly  ethical  and  spiritual  views 
of  the  conduct  of  life,  he  was  seeking  to  arouse  Friends 
from  the  religious  indifference  into  which  over-attention 
to  the  letter  of  the  law  had  led  them,  Samuel  Fothergill 
arrived  from  England.  He  was  the  son  of  that  John 
Fothergill  who  had  made  three  visits  to  America,  the  last 
extending  from  1736  to  1739.  His  preaching  was 
forceful,  and  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  at  this  period  near 
the  middle  of  the  century,  Whitefield,  Woolman,  and  the 
Fothergills,  father  and  son,  were  all  labouring  in  their 


CH.IV      JOHN  WOOLMAN:   THE   INDIANS       411 

respective  fields  with  great  effect.  Whitefield  and  Wool  man 
died  within  three  years  of  each  other. 

Samuel  Fothergill  landed  in  1754.  He  was  a  man  of 
remarkable  influence  and  ability,  with  a  gift  for  organisation 
and  a  breadth  of  view  singularly  calculated  to  advise 
wisely  in  the  perplexed  time  when  he  visited  the  colonies. 
Remarkable  results  followed  his  two  years  in  America. 
The  Indian  frontier  wars  were  at  their  height,  and  he 
encouraged  Friends  to  withdraw  from  activity  in  the 
legislative  bodies  of  the  provinces,  rather  than  compromise 
their  distinguishing  testimonies.  To  him  the  Society  owes 
much  of  the  movement  which  revived  and  enforced  the 
discipline  in  London  in  1760,  with  an  immediate  effect 
upon  all  the  American  meetings. 

The  mutterings  of  the  Revolutionary  War  were  now 
beginning  to  be  heard.  English  Friends  continued  to 
visit  America,  often  in  the  endeavour  to  strengthen  the 
hands  of  the  brethren,  although  few  of  them,  except  Dr. 
Fothergill,  brother  of  Samuel,  and  one  or  two  others  who 
gave  careful  study  to  the  situation  and  kept  in  corre 
spondence  with  the  colonial  Quakers,  could  understand 
the  very  difficult  position  in  which  the  latter  found 
themselves.  Among  the  last  to  come  over  was  Elizabeth 
Robinson,  from  Yorkshire,  who,  in  a  visit  to  the  family 
in  Philadelphia  where  young  Thomas  Scattergood  of 
Burlington  was  serving  his  apprenticeship,  was  the  means 
of  awakening  him  to  a  sense  of  his  spiritual  needs,  and  he 
became  a  well-known  minister.  Between  1775  and  1785 
no  English  Friend  crossed  the  Atlantic  for  service  as  a 
preacher,  the  difficulties  being  too  great.  The  meeting  at 
Burlington  in  1775  notes  the  reading  of  the  caution 
issued  by  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings,  advising  "  close 
adherence  to  the  principles  of  Quakerism  in  these  times 
of  commotion."  The  Quarterly  Meeting  minutes  for 
ii  mo.  24,  1777,  state  that  twenty-six  Representatives 
from  the  preceding  Quarterly  Meeting  of  Ministers  and 
Elders  had  been  prevented  from  attending  Yearly  Meeting 
because  "  hindered  from  crossing  the  River  (Delaware)  by 
military  men  stopping  the  boats  on  this  side,  on  account 


412    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  rv 

of  the  British  Troops  being  in  possession  of  the  city  of 
Philadelphia."  Germantown  also  was  occupied  by  General 
Howe,  who  had  taken  possession  of  the  town  in  September. 
The  Friends  at  Trenton,  New  Jersey,  were  obliged  to  meet 
in  private  houses,  their  meeting-house  being  occupied  by 
soldiers  ;  and  when,  one  day,  the  Burlington  Friends  came 
in  to  the  town  to  Monthly  Meeting,  they  discovered  that  the 
militia  had  occupied  the  house  for  quarters  during  the  night. 

The  Friends  suffered  much  throughout  the  war,  certain 
neighbourhoods  in  New  Jersey  feeling  particularly  the 
sorrows  of  the  time.  Both  armies  moved  through  New 
Jersey,  General  Howe's  army  causing  much  damage  in 
the  "  Quaker "  counties  of  the  state.  Distraints  on  the 
part  of  the  Americans  were  heavy,  one  Friend  with  a  wife 
and  child  near  Mount  Holly  being  obliged  to  flee,  when 
their  home  was  plundered  ;  another  with  eleven  children 
was  stripped  of  all  his  property  by  both  contending  armies. 
Through  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings,  English  Friends 
contributed  generously  to  the  aid  of  their  persecuted 
brethren,  one  of  the  Friends  referred  to  receiving  fifty  and 
the  other  seventy-five  pounds  in  this  way. 

Private  journals  and  correspondence  of  the  time  show 
how  the  subject  of  national  independence  was  moving 
Friends  in  New  Jersey.  Their  position  was  trying,  and 
speedily  became  most  grave.  Many  young  men  yielded 
to  the  impulse,  which  also  drew  away  some  of  the 
older  ones,  to  enlist  in  the  cause  of  the  Americans 
Sympathising  epistles  came  from  London,  and  during  the 
struggle  which  followed,  despite  trials  consequent  upon  a 
position  of  neutrality  among  people  alive  with  the  spirit 
of  warfare,  they  steadily  maintained  their  principles  and 
profession,  although  at  the  expense,  in  many  cases,  of  the 
confiscation  of  goods  and  property.  To  all  inquirers  they 
replied,  as  one  meeting  stated  in  a  special  minute : 

"We,  the  people  called  Quakers,  ever  since  we  were  dis 
tinguished  as  a  Society,  have  declared  to  the  world  our  belief 
in  the  peaceable  tendency  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  and  that 
consistent  therewith  we  could  not  bear  arms,  nor  be  concerned 
in  warlike  preparations." 


CH.  iv      JOHN  WOOLMAN:   THE   INDIANS       413 

When  the  hostilities  were  over,  came  sufferings  in  the 
effort  of  readjustment, — the  price  paid  for  neutrality. 
Prosperity  in  material  things  smiled  at  last  upon  the 
Friends ;  but  never  again  were  they  to  see  and  experience 
the  power  and  freshness  so  marked  in  the  earlier  days. 
They  had  received  with  almost  the  last  breath  of  George 
Fox  his  thought  and  blessing  in  one  of  his  dying  ex 
pressions — the  charge  to  his  companions,  "  Mind  poor 
Friends  in  America." 


BOOK   V 

THE   QUAKERS    IN    PENNSYLVANIA 
BY   ISAAC   SHARPLESS 


-MS 


CHAPTER    I 

THE   SETTLEMENT 

THE  persecution  of  the  Friends  in  England  had  varying 
results,  depending  on  the  character  and  circumstances  of 
the  victims.  To  the  man  of  nerve  and  conscience  it 
taught  a  more  close  and  fearless  adherence  to  his  station 
and  its  duties.  When  the  Conventicle  Act  of  1664  was 
passed,  an  Act  intended  to  break  up  all  forms  of  worship 
except  those  of  the  established  church,  George  Fox  wrote 
to  his  followers : 

"  Now  is  the  time  for  you  to  stand,  you  that  have  been  public 
men  (ministers)  and  formerly  did  travel  abroad ;  mind  and  keep 
up  your  testimony,  go  into  your  meeting-houses  as  at  other 
times." 

He  himself  went  to  London  "  where  the  storm  was 
about  to  begin."  When  he  heard  that  there  were  stocks 
prepared  for  him  at  Evesham  he  went  there  and  had  "  a 
glorious  meeting."  Such  was  usually  the  conduct  of  the 
leaders.  They  never  flinched  or  fled — almost  at  times 
they  seemed  to  court  persecution,  and  enjoy  it.  William 
Dewsbury  said :  "  I  never  played  the  coward  but  as 
joyfully  entered  prisons  as  palaces,  and  in  the  prison-house, 
I  sang  praises  to  my  God  and  esteemed  the  bolts  and 
locks  upon  me  as  jewels."  They  fought  it  out  on  this 
line  and  in  the  end  conquered,  but  many  times  the  issue 
seemed  doubtful,  the  conflict  interminable,  and  the  reward 
hardly  worth  the  suffering.  To  many  it  seemed  that  they 
could  do  more  good  by  attempting  to  establish  a  godly 
commonwealth  in  America  than  by  undertaking  the 

417  2  E 


4i8    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    UK.  v 

seemingly  impossible  task  of  reforming  the  intolerant 
institutions  of  England.  So  when  William  Penn  opened 
the  way,  many  thousands  were  immediately  ready  to  take 
advantage  of  the  offer. 

It  was  not,  however,  a  new  idea  with  Penn  in  1681. 
Twenty  years  before,  George  Fox  had  commissioned 
Josiah  Coale  to  seek  such  a  home  in  the  new  world,  and 
during  the  intervening  time  many  longing  eyes  had  turned 
in  that  direction.  William  Penn  tells  us : 

"This  I  can  say  that  I  had  an  opening  of  joy  as  to  these 
parts  [the  American  Colonies]  in  the  year  1661  at  Oxford  twenty 
years  since." 

This  was  when  he  was  a  student  of  seventeen.  Whether 
he  referred  to  this  as  a  dream  of  youth  to  found  an  ideal 
state,  a  reflection  from  his  studies  or  the  temper  of  his 
associates,  or,  as  the  word  "  opening  "  was  commonly  used 
by  the  Friends  of  the  time,  a  divine  revelation,  we  shall 
not  know.  But  when  the  opportunity  came  in  the  Jerseys 
to  make  this  dream  something  of  a  reality,  he  quickly 
embraced  it,  and  wove  into  the  fabric  of  the  government 
there  his  advanced  ideas  of  civil  and  religious  liberty  and 
equality. 

There  was,  however,  not  a  clear  field.  The  real  Quaker 
preserve  had  not  been  found.  At  the  best  it  would 
be  a  mixed  experiment,  but  it  gave  him  a  foretaste  and 
a  clear  conception  of  better  things  which  might  follow. 

The  opportunity  came  in  1681.  No  other  than 
William  Penn  could  have  embraced  it.  Two  considera 
tions  came  to  his  aid.  One  was  his  great  influence 
at  court,  an  influence  gained  in  spite  of  his  religious 
peculiarities,  and  his  open  opposition  to  the  libertinism  of 
the  Stuarts,  gained  as  the  result  of  his  father's  high  station 
and  services,  his  own  most  gracious  but  not  obsequious 
manners,  the  quickness  of  his  intelligence,  and  the  respect 
felt  for  his  ability  and  character.  The  Duke  of  York, 
afterwards  James  II.  was  his  own  and  his  father's  friend, 
and  a  long  list  of  titled  associates  loyally  aided  his 
plans. 


CH.I  THE  SETTLEMENT  419 

The  other  consideration  was  a  claim  he  had  upon  the 
crown  for  ;£  16,000  due  his  father's  estate  for  a  loan 
and  interest  This  he  proposed  to  relinquish  in  return 
for  a  lordly  province  in  America,  and  Pennsylvania  came 
into  his  hands.  To  this  the  Duke  of  York  added  what 
is  now  Delaware.  The  boy's  dream  was  to  be  realised 
and  the  Quaker  hopes  brought  to  fruition. 

The  royal  ignorance  of  geography  made  trouble  in 
years  to  come.  The  King  meant  to  give  Penn  three 
degrees  of  latitude  and  five  of  longitude,  but  the  former 
was  impossible  between  Maryland  and  New  York,  and 
the  southern  boundary  was  a  source  of  contest  with  Lord 
Baltimore  for  many  years,  and  kept  Penn  in  England 
when  he  wanted  to  be  among  his  settlers. 

He  sent  over  his  cousin  William  Markham  to  receive 
the  fealty  of  the  few  settlers  along  the  western  bank  of 
the  Delaware — Swedes  and  Dutch  and  a  few  Quakers  who 
had  straggled  over  from  New  Jersey  and  settled  opposite 
Burlington,  at  Tacony  and  on  the  Schuylkill,  and  at 
Upland  (now  Chester).1  Markham  was  also  to  arrange 
for  the  purchase  of  land  from  the  Indians,  to  select  the 
site  of  Philadelphia,  and  to  lay  out  the  town. 

William  Penn  was  Governor  of  the  new  state,  and  had 

1  Dankers  and  Sluyter,  two  Dutchmen,  travelled  through  these  Delaware 
Settlements  in  1679-80.  With  no  friendly  hand  they  depict  the  character  of  these 
first  Quakers  along  the  Delaware.  On  igth  November  1679,  at  Burlington,  "  We 
went  into  the  meeting  of  the  Quakers  who  went  to  work  very  unceremoniously 
and  loosely.  What  they  uttered  was  mostly  in  one  tone  and  the  same  thing,  and 
so  it  continued  until  we  were  tired  out  and  went  away. "  They  describe  them  as 
"  most  worldly  of  men,"  as  an  evidence  of  which  they  found  a  copy  of  Virgil 
on  the  table  of  one,  and  also  a  book  of  van  Helmont's.  "  Most  of  them  are 
miserably  self-minded  in  physical  and  religious  knowledge." 

When  they  got  down  to  Tinicum,  an  island  in  the  Delaware  River  below 
Philadelphia,  ' '  In  the  evening  there  arrived  three  Quakers,  of  whom  one  was  their 
great  prophetess,  who  travels  through  the  whole  country  in  order  to  quake.  She 
lives  in  Maryland  and  forsakes  husband  and  children,  plantation  and  all,  and  goes 
off  for  this  purpose.  She  had  been  to  Boston  and  had  been  arrested  by  the  authori 
ties  on  account  of  her  quakery,  .  .  .  They  sat  by  the  fire  and  drank  a  dram  of 
rum  with  each  other  and  in  a  short  time  after  began  to  shake  and  groan  so  that 
we  did  not  know  what  had  happened  and  supposed  they  were  going  to  preach 
but  nothing  came  of  it." 

They  found  at  Upland  two  widows  who  were  at  variance  and  whom  the 
"prophetess"  was  trying  to  reconcile.  "One  of  these  widows  named  Anna 
Salters  lived  at  Tokany  and  was  one  of  those  who,  when  a  certain  person  gave 
himself  out  as  the  Lord  Jesus  and  allowed  himself  to  be  carried  around  on  an  ass, 
shouted  Hosanna  as  he  rode  over  her  garments,  for  which  conduct  he  was  arrested, 
his  tongue  bored  through  with  a  hot  iron  and  his  forehead  branded  with  a  B  for 


420   QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

power  to  form  its  constitution  and  laws  subject  to  the 
consent  of  the  settlers.  He  was  also  owner  of  the  land, 
and  could  sell  it  to  whom  and  on  what  terms  he  chose. 
But  he  made  it  cheap,  as  there  was  plenty  of  it,  and  he 
must  have  settlers. 

He  himself  landed  at  New  Castle,  Delaware,  on  the 
27th  of  October  1682  in  the  Welcome.  There  had  been 
a  wearisome  voyage  of  nine  weeks,  and  of  the  hundred  who 
sailed  thirty  died  of  small-pox  on  the  ocean.  By  easy 
stages  he  went  to  Upland  (which  he  now  called  Chester), 
to  the  hospitable  home  of  Robert  Wade,  and  then  to 
Philadelphia,  where  he  landed  at  the  foot  of  Dock-Creek. 
Tradition  says  that  the  Indians  met  him  there,  and  that 
he  gained  their  confidence  by  joining  them  in  their  feast 
of  roasted  acorns  and  excelling  them  in  jumping.  He 
called  together  the  assembly  at  Chester,  which  in  a  three 
days'  session  adopted  a  constitution  and  a  body  of 
laws. 

Friends  came  rapidly  into  the  province.  It  need  not 
be  assumed  that  it  was  release  from  penalties  alone 
which  brought  these  godly  people  to  Pennsylvania.  Before 
Penn  left  England  he  had  published  Some  Account  of 
the  Province  of  Pennsylvania.  It  was  an  advertisement 
for  settlers,  an  analysis  of  the  social  and  political  condi 
tions  of  England,  and  how  these  conditions  would  be 
bettered  for  the  colonists  by  emigration.  He  told  of  the 
noble  river  which  fronted  the  province,  the  many  square 
miles  of  good  land,  the  great  forests,  the  wild  animals, 
the  furs,  the  possible  productions  of  the  country,  in 
tempting  terms. 

Then  he  explained  how  the  government  would  be  free 
and  democratic,  without  religious  or  political  disabilities. 
He  further  urged  that  there  would  be  place  there  for 

blasphemer.  She  was  not  only  one  of  these  but  she  anointed  his  head  and  feet 
and  wiped  them  with  her  hair."  This  refers  to  the  Bristol  [England]  episode  of 
James  Nayler  a  score  of  years  before. 

Our  travellers  speak  highly  of  Robert  Wade  and  his  wife,  the  pioneer  Friends 
of  Pennsylvania  who  had  come  from  Salem  to  Upland  in  1675.  They  were 
"  the  best  Quakers  we  have  seen  "  and  "  could  not  endure  "  Anna  Sailers. 

These  early  days  of  venture  and  suffering  brought  out  the  crudity  as  well  as 
the  heroism  of  some  of  the  Friends. 


CH.I  THE  SETTLEMENT  421 

mechanics  and  tradesmen  of  all  sorts,  younger  brothers 
without  means,  and  "  men  of  universal  spirits  "  who  wanted 
to  work  out  the  problems  of  good  government. 

Many  of  all  sorts  came — solid  Friends  who  had 
endured  the  horrors  of  English  prisons  with  a  kindly 
spirit  to  all  the  world,  men  of  education  and  means 
seeking  larger  estates,  renters  who  wished  to  be  land 
owners,  millers,  handicraftsmen  of  many  kinds,  adventurers 
for  gain,  some  fairly  good  and  some  criminal.  But  at 
first  the  better  elements  were  in  large  preponderance  and 
in  absolute  control.  They  entered  into  the  spirit  of  the 
enterprise,  did  their  best  to  support  the  institutions  which 
their  governor  and  proprietor  placed  before  them,  and 
were  melted  together  in  their  simple  but  solemn  religious 
meetings. 

For  the  most  of  them  it  was  a  happy  exchange  from 
the  social  and  political  rigours  of  England.  Here  was  a 
country  at  their  hands,  to  be  owned  for  a  trifling  yearly 
rental,  a  government  in  which  they  were  partners,  no 
disabilities  to  trouble  them,  no  classes  to  shame  them. 
Some  of  them  had  their  heads  turned  by  the  sudden 
access  of  power,  and  they  became,  as  William  Penn 
expressed  it,  "  too  governmentish,"  too  democratic,  too 
inclined  to  find  little  grievances,  too  in  appreciative  of 
what  they  had  gained. 

The  work  began  promptly : 

"  At  a  monthly  meeting  of  the  8th  of  gth  month  (November) 
1682;  at  this  time  Governor  William  Penn  arrived  here  and 
erected  a  city  called  Philadelphia,  about  half  a  mile  from 
Shackamaxon  where  .  .  .  meetings  were  established."  l 

At  the  same  time  farmers  were  pressing  into  the 
country  from  Chester,  Philadelphia  and  Bristol,  taking  up 
the  plots  they  had  purchased  in  England  from  rough 
maps.  The  work  of  surveying  went  on  rapidly,  but  there 
must  have  been  much  neighbourly  consideration  to  allow 
all  to  locate  so  peacefully. 

Only  two  boat  loads  of  immigrants  came  to  Pennsyl- 

1  Watson,  Annals  of  Philadelphia,  \.  140. 


422    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

vania  in  1681 — one  from  London  and  one  from  Bristol. 
But  in  1682  the  stream  fairly  began.  Many  reached  the 
country  before  Penn.  Twenty-three  vessels  sailed  up  the 
Delaware  during  the  year,  and  these  probably  brought 
2000  passengers.  We  hear  nothing  of  any  men  of 
prominence  in  these  early  days  except  Friends.  The 
first  legislature  was  made  up  of  Friends  and  of  Swedes 
and  Dutch  who  were  already  in  the  country. 

The  Pennsylvania  Friends  represented  nearly  all 
parts  of  the  British  Isles.  Many  came  from  Yorkshire 
and  the  midland  counties  of  England.  London  and 
Bristol  and  their  neighbourhoods  sent  their  contingents, 
and  Wales  a  small  army.  Later  many  came  from  the 
north  of  Ireland,  converted  from  Presbyterianism  by 
William  Edmundson  and  his  friends.  The  eastern 
counties,  where  Puritanism  was  the  strongest,  contained 
fewer  Friends.  Their  restless  spirits  had  gone  to  New 
England.  Penn's  acquaintance  along  the  Rhine  brought 
in  the  Mennonites  and  kindred  sects,  and  the  province 
in  these  early  days  grew  rapidly,  and  with  harmonious 
elements.  But  we  must  study  something  of  the  character 
of  the  great  leader  before  we  can  understand  the  state 
that  he  founded  and  the  religious  body  for  whom  and 
with  whom  he  worked. 


CHAPTER    II 

WILLIAM    PENN    IN    PENNSYLVANIA 

WITH  William  Penn  as  a  founder  of  a  state,  this  history 
has  to  do  only  indirectly.  There  is  little  doubt  that  the 
democratic  character  of  the  ideas  which  he  at  the  first 
advocated  so  enthusiastically  produced  its  effect  upon  the 
development  of  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting.  After  the 
partisan  struggles  of  the  first  thirty  years  of  colonial 
history,  when  he  was  assailed  with  harsh  and  bitter 
criticism,  had  passed  away,  a  more  just  appreciation  of 
his  services  gradually  found  place.  This  grew,  after  his 
death,  into  a  profound  and  loyal  respect.  Friends  vied 
with  each  other  in  quoting  his  religious  and  political 
tenets,  as  authorities  which  they  held  in  ever  increasing 
veneration. 

He  wrote  easily  and  he  wrote  voluminously.  He 
pondered  deeply  upon  many  phases  of  theological  and 
governmental  theory,  and  presented  his  thoughts  in 
printed  form.  He  wrote  too  easily  and  under  too  varied 
impulses,  and,  like  such  writers,  it  is  often  hard  to 
reconcile  his  statements  with  each  other.  The  general 
trend  both  of  his  theological  and  political  views  is,  how 
ever,  so  evident  and  so  abundantly  and  happily  expressed 
that  they  became  in  time  the  basis  of  the  government  of 
Pennsylvania  and  the  expressions  of  the  doctrine  and 
policy  of  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting.  They  were 
followed  too  literally  and  had  the  odour  of  too  great 
sanctity.  For  what  with  him  were  only  means  and 
expedients,  became,  under  his  less  broad-minded  followers, 
ends  and  fixed  principles. 

423 


424    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

To  appreciate  subsequent  history,  a  critical  estimate 
of  this  remarkable  man,  whose  qualities  shine  more 
highly  with  each  succeeding  investigation,  becomes  a 
necessity.  His  biographers  have  copied  from  each  other, 
and  perhaps  too  carelessly  accepted  tradition  as  to 
particular  events  which  have  not  stood  the  test  ot  closer 
examination ;  but  enough  of  well  authenticated  facts, 
letters  of  himself  and  of  judicious  friends,  epistles  on 
religion  and  government,  and  the  undisputed  actions  of 
his  public  and  private  career,  exist  from  which  to  frame 
an  estimate  of  his  strength  and  weakness. 

Hepworth  Dixon  and  others  seem  to  have  effectually 
answered  Macaulay's  charges  to  his  discredit.  It  is 
unfortunate,  however,  that  they  are  embalmed  in  that 
historian's  brilliant  style  and  perennially  interesting 
volumes.  Where  a  score  read  the  attack  but  one  knows 
of  the  defence,  and  so  the  misstatements  will  for  ever  be 
renewed  and  believed. 

There  are,  however,  certain  weaknesses  of  Penn's 
character,  not  seriously  discreditable  to  him,  but  which 
detract  something  from  the  universal  praise  often  accorded 
him.  He  was  a  poor  judge  of  character.  His  Deputy- 
Governors  were  often  most  unfortunate  selections.  Black- 
well,  an  old  Cromwellian  soldier,  honest  and  moral,  had 
no  appreciation  of  the  Quaker  character  with  which  and 
over  which  he  was  to  govern.  He  was,  as  he  admitted, 
"  unequally  yoked "  and  "  unfeignedly  gave  thanks  to 
God  "  when  he  was  recalled.  Evans,  a  young  libertine, 
swollen  with  a  puerile  self-conceit,  offended  in  every  way 
his  best  friends  and  made  endless  troubles  for  Penn. 
Gookin,  severe  and  unyielding,  with  a  stubbornness 
lapsing  into  insanity,  was  an  unquestioned  misfit.  The 
better  judgment  of  Penn's  widow  saved  the  day  for  the 
family  after  this  succession  of  failures. 

It  is  true  the  problem  was  a  hard  one.  A  Friend 
would  not  perform  the  duties  which  involved  certain 
military  declarations  and  offices  ;  these  they  were  quite 
willing  that  others  should  undertake,  but  against  them 
their  own  consciences  rebelled.  The  Deputy-Governor  must, 


CH.II  WILLIAM  PENN   IN   PENNSYLVANIA    425 

therefore,  not  be  a  Friend.  He  must,  however,  be  accept 
able  to  them,  appreciating  their  spirit  and  respecting  their 
scruples,  for  by  virtue  both  of  numbers  and  character 
they  controlled  the  situation.  They  were  to  be  his 
partners,  not  his  subordinates,  and  with  the  extravagant 
idea  of  their  rights  and  privileges  which  some  of  them  had, 
they  were  no  easy  partners  to  work  with.  The  ideal 
Governor  must  not  only  be  self-respecting,  but  tactful  ; 
not  only  a  strict  moralist,  but  tolerant  of  differing 
standards ;  not  only  faithful  to  Penn's  interests,  but 
appreciative  of  the  people's  liberties.  Not  one  of  Penn's 
choices,  with  the  possible  exception  of  Thomas  Lloyd, 
possessed  all  these  qualities,  and  bitterly  the  proprietor 
paid  the  price  of  his  poor  judgment  in  thirty  years  of 
governmental  confusion  and  financial  loss. 

The  account  of  Penn's  relations  to  his  knavish  steward 
is  not  pleasant  reading  for  his  friends.  Ford  was  a 
Friend  and  a  business  man  of  ability.  Penn  placed  all 
his  affairs  in  Ford's  hands  and  dismissed  his  care  of  them. 
Full  of  great  schemes  of  philanthropy,  his  influence 
eagerly  sought  for  suffering  Friends  and  suitors  of  all 
kinds,  this  is  not  a  matter  of  wonder.  But  when  the 
fraudulent  nature  of  his  doings  was  known  to  Penn,  or 
might  easily  have  been  known,  he  still  allowed  matters  to 
proceed,  heaping  up  claim  upon  claim  till  the  province 
became  mortgaged  and  his  friends  had  infinite  difficulty 
in  untangling  the  complicated  fraud.  At  first  it  was 
misplaced  confidence,  which  any  busy  man  might  have 
fallen  into.  Then  lest  the  plight  which  had  happened  to 
him  should  injure  the  Holy  Experiment,  he  allowed  it  to 
proceed  and  kept  it  quiet,  thus  piling  up  untold  suffering 
and  trouble  and  a  term  in  the  debtor's  prison  for  himself, 
and  much  vexation  and  expense  for  his  friends,  which  an 
earlier,  vigorous  exposure  might  have  avoided.  There 
was  nothing  dishonest  or  illiberal  in  his  course,  only  a 
suggestion  of  a  lack  of  downright  positiveness  in 
extricating  himself  honourably  from  an  unfortunate 
position. 

The    question    of   military   resistance   was    the   great 


426    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES    BK.  v 

difficulty  in  a  Quaker  state,  which  finally  wrought  the 
downfall  of  the  body  which  opposed  it.  Prior  to  the 
downfall,  the  Friends  had,  in  many  cases,  held  their 
places  by  pursuing  what  seems  like  a  doubtful  course, 
going  further  than  strict  consistency  would  approve. 
Penn  himself  was  not  quite  clear  of  some  equivocation 
in  the  matter.  As  we  have  seen,  he  appointed  non- 
Quaker  deputies  to  perform  acts  which  he  and  no  other 
Friend  would  consider  consistent  with  their  profession  ; 
to  "  be  stiff  with  our  neighbours  upon  occasion "  as  he 
once  said. 

This  may  be  defensible,  for  liberty  of  the  individual 
conscience  was  their  great  claim.  But  when  Penn 
recovered  his  right  to  govern  his  province  in  1693,  it  was 
the  result  of  a  promise  that  he  would  faithfully  transmit 
to  the  Assembly  all  kingly  commands  for  military  aid, 
which  "  he  doubted  not "  that  body  would  honour.  It  did 
not  honour  the  first  communication  he  made  in  compliance 
with  this  implied  contract,  and  Penn  must  have  known 
that  it  would  not  and  that  he  would  not  urge  it  to. 

Fortunately  the  trouble  was  only  ephemeral,  and  no 
one  called  for  a  literal  enforcement  of  the  condition,  but 
this  hardly  acquits  Penn  of  something  like  hedging  in  his 
dealings  with  the  Crown,  a  stroke  of  diplomacy  very 
venial  in  that  day,  but  not  quite  consistent  with  an  open 
and  perfectly  transparent  character. 

These,  then,  seem  to  be  the  weak  spots  in  Penn's 
record,  an  inability  to  judge  men  and  a  certain  timidity 
in  dealing  with  difficult  situations,  when  his  larger  plans 
would  be  thereby  endangered.  More  than  this  can 
hardly  be  fairly  charged  against  him.  These  were  the 
causes  of  the  most  of  his  troubles.  Good  deputies  and 
bold  strokes  to  rid  himself  of  the  webs  of  chicanery  his 
personal  and  political  enemies  had  woven  around  him 
would  have  kept  the  temper  of  the  colonists  sweet  and 
loyal  and  his  own  actions  free  to  carry  out  his  plans. 
When  he  went  to  jail  for  a  matter  of  conscience,  every 
one  of  his  friends  must  have  felt  a  thrill  of  pride  as  he 
declared  :  "  My  prison  shall  be  my  grave  before  I  will 


CH.  ii   WILLIAM   PENN  IN   PENNSYLVANIA    427 

budge  a  jot,  for  I  owe  obedience  of  the  conscience  to  no 
mortal  man."  But  when  he  sent  out  his  frantic  appeals 
to  Logan  to  gather  in  his  dues,  and  allowed  his  friends  to 
raise  a  subscription  to  pay  off  the  indebtedness  he  had 
unwittingly  contracted,  when  he  lay  months  in  Fleet 
prison  waiting  for  his  creditors  to  come  to  terms,  there 
must  have  been  a  loss  of  respect  among  those  who 
looked  to  him  for  leadership,  even  though  these  were 
recognised  as  under  the  circumstances  right  and  necessary 
things  to  do,  and  to  be  the  result  of  no  moral  obliquity 
on  his  part. 

The  other  side  of  Penn's  character  is  more  pleasing  to 
contemplate,  and  is  so  much  more  impressive  that  the 
flaws  seem  insignificant.  He  was  profoundly  and  sincerely 
religious,  and  his  personal  life  was  far  above  the  ordinary 
vices  of  his  age.  This  was  questioned  probably  but  once. 
When  a  persecuting  Judge  suggested  that  the  early  career 
of  the  prisoner  had  been  guilty  of  some  of  the  sins 
against  which  he  was  declaiming,  Penn  indignantly  denied 
it  and  challenged  any  one  to  prove  that  by  word  or  deed 
he  had,  even  in  his  more  thoughtless  youth,  ever  offended 
against  the  standards  of  a  strict  morality.  The  Judge 
was  rebuked  by  a  fellow  judge,  who  admitted  the  truth  of 
Penn's  denial  and  told  his  associate  that  he  had  gone  too 
far.  The  truth  of  the  declaration  may  well  be  admitted. 
Only  purity  of  life,  or  arch  hypocrisy,  could  be  the  basis 
of  such  beautiful  precepts  of  morality  and  piety  as  we 
find  in  his  writings,  and  the  latter  alternative  will  hardly 
be  claimed  by  any  one. 

The  wisdom  of  many  of  his  Fruits  of  Solitude,  the 
fervent  appeal  to  the  reader  at  the  beginning  of  No  Cross, 
No  Crown,  the  fitting  and  eloquent  eulogy  on  George 
Fox,  and  many  others  which  will  occur  to  any  readers  of 
his  works,  could  hardly  be  the  product  of  a  character 
which  had  ever  suffered  a  moral  relapse.  Nor  is  there 
evidence  that  the  validity  of  his  inspired  ministry  or  the 
profound  respect  and  influence  accorded  to  his  preaching 
was  questioned  by  his  rather  exacting  collaborators  in  the 
Gospel  among  Friends.  It  is  no  proof  of  this  that 


428    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

crowds  flocked  to  hear  him l  in  England  when  he  was 
expected  to  be  present  at  a  meeting,  for  this  is  the  meed 
of  every  preacher  who  has  for  the  time  being  the 
popular  ear. 

A  better  evidence  is  the  judgment  of  friends  expressed 
in  private  correspondence.  Isaac  Norris  writes  in  1701, 
just  as  Penn  was  leaving  the  province  the  second  time : 

"  The  unhappy  misunderstandings  in  some  and  unwarrantable 
oppositions  in  others  have  been  a  block  to  our  plenary  comforts 
in  him,  and  his  own  quiet ;  but  these  things  are  externals  only. 
Our  communion  in  the  church  sweetens  all,  and  our  inward 
waitings  and  worships  together  have  often  been  a  general 
comfort  and  consolation ;  and  in  this  I  take  a  degree  of  satisfac 
tion,  after  all,  that  we  part  in  love ;  and  some  of  his  last  words 
in  meeting  yesterday,  were  '  that  he  looked  over  all  infirmities  and 
outwards,  and  had  an  eye  to  the  regions  of  spirits,  wherein  is  our 
surest  tie ' ;  and  in  true  love,  there  he  took  his  leave  of  us."  2 

Again  in  1 707,  when  the  proprietor  was  in  the  darkest 
days  of  his  difficulties  with  the  Fords,  Isaac  Norris  writes : 

"  The  more  he  is  pressed,  the  more  he  rises.  He  seems  of  a 
spirit  fit  to  bear  and  to  rub  through  difficulties,  and  after  all,  as 
thou  observes,  '  his  foundation  remains.'  " 8 

William  Penn  was  one  of  those  choice  beings  whose 
soul  was  attuned  to  Divine  harmonies,  and  whose  power 
could  be  felt  by  kindred  spirits  in  the  life  of  Christ 
When  he  was  coming  to  Pennsylvania  in  1699,  he 
received  three  certificates  from  his  Friends  in  England, 
one  from  "  the  Second -day's  Meeting  of  Ministering 
Friends,"  in  London,  one  from  the  Friends  in  Bristol, 
where  he  had  resided  for  a  considerable  time,  and  one 
from  the  Monthly  Meeting  of  Horsham.  They  are  all 
most  appreciative.  The  last  tells  of — 

"  Our  unity  and  communion  with  him.  .  .  .  He  had  been  a 
holy  and  blessed  instrument  in  the  hands  of  the  Lord,  both  in 

1  Thomas  Story  writes  in  1697  of  meetings  in  Dublin  :   "  Great  was  the  resort 
of  people  of  all  ranks  and  professions  to  our  meetings,  chiefly  on  account  of  our 
friend  William  Penn,  who  was  ever  furnished  by  the  truth  with  matter  fully  to 
answer  their  expectations.     Many  of  the  clergy  were  there  and  the  people  with 
one  voice  spoke  well  of  what  they  heard." 

2  Penn  and  Logan  Correspondence.  8  Ibid. 


CH.II   WILLIAM  PENN  IN  PENNSYLVANIA    429 

his  ministry  and  conversation  [conduct]  and  hath  always  sought 
the  prosperity  of  the  blessed  truth  and  peace  and  concord  in  the 
Church  of  Christ ;  and  both  walked  among  us  in  all  humility, 
good  sincerity  and  true  brotherly  love  to  our  great  refreshment 
and  comfort." 

There  was  some  adverse  sentiment.  In  Pennsylvania, 
this  had,  to  a  large  extent,  a  political  basis,  and  was  led 
by  David  Lloyd  and  Griffith  Jones,  both  probably 
estimable  men,  but  whose  extreme  demands  created  a 
partisan  feeling  that  extended  into  the  meeting.1  These 
men  were  correspondents  and  in  sympathetic  relations 
with  William  Mead  and  Thomas  Lower,  who  are  spoken 
of  in  the  letters  of  the  day2  as  representing  the 
opposition  party.  George  Whitehead  is  often  associated 
with  them. 

This  opposition  from  within  was  largely  due  to  Penn's 
supposed  aristocratic  tendencies  and  possible  departure 
from  a  proper  simplicity  in  his  relations  with  the  courtly 
influences  among  which  he  moved,  and  also  to  the  Ford 
question  and  the  doings  of  Evans  as  deputy-governor. 
It  was  later  swallowed  up  by  the  prevailing  and  warmly 
expressed  regard,  as  these  matters  were  seen  to  be 
perfectly  consistent  with  his  profession  and  exalted 
character.  After  1710,  both  the  personal  and  political 
antagonism  ceased  in  Pennsylvania,  and  those  who  had 
been  considered  as  opponents  lost  their  influence.  The 

1  "  Our  meetings  for  business  are  now  so  much  injured  by  some  young  forward 
novices  and  a  few  partisans  of  D.  Lloyd,  still  a  close  member,  that  the  more 
sound  and  ancient  Friends  do  not  venture  upon  anything  there  that  concerns  the 
government,  expecting  a  separation  upon  it  whenever  it  is  taken  in  hand. 
According  to  present  appearances  of  things,  a  separation  will  in  time  be  unavoid 
able,  and  that  after  Friends  (in  England)  have  taken  notice  of  proceedings  here, 
nothing  less  than  a  general  purge  will  ensue.  J.  Logan,  4  mo.  28,  1707." 

8  ' '  There  is  a  short  communication  held  between  thy  opposites  among  Friends 
there  and  that  corrupted  generation  here.  G.  Whitehead  has  wrote  a  most  affec 
tionate  letter  to  Griffith  Jones.  He  expresses  himself  as  thy  friend,  but  we  know 
how  he  is  linked  with  the  Mead  and  Lower  Party.  I  believe  George  is  mistaken 
in  Griffith,  and  knows  not  that  he  is  not  received  in  unity  with  Friends." 

James  Logan  to  William  Penn,  6  mo.  10,  1706. 

"  They  address  such  on  this  side  the  water  (England)  who  are  judged  by  them 
to  be  not  in  the  best  understanding  with  him." 

Isaac  Norris  to  Joseph  Pike,  i  mo.  (March)  18,  1707. 

"Write  a  close  letter  to  Friends  concerning  D.  Lloyd  insisting  on  that 
remonstrance  and  his  directing  letters  to  thy  enemies." 

James  Logan  to  William  Penn,  12  mo,  (February)  1709. 

See  Penn  and  Logan  Correspondence. 


430    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

English  opposition,  always  less  well  defined  and  based 
on  more  shadowy  grounds,  seems  also  to  have  disappeared 
about  the  same  time.  So  that,  cleared  of  his  financial 
troubles,  his  colony  loyal,  and  his  enemies  evanescent,  he 
spent  the  last  two  years  of  his  vigorous  life  in  a  serene 
atmosphere  of  success  and  triumph.  The  stroke  that 
then  deprived  him  of  his  mental  power,  but  left  his 
spiritual  faculties  unimpaired,  brought  him  universal 
sympathy  and  appreciation. 

Mentally,  Penn  was  one  of  the  great  men  of  his  times. 
It  was  a  day  of  young  men.  The  great  preachers  were 
nearly  all  under  thirty,  but  this  might  be  consistent  with 
ordinary  intelligence.  Penn  was  more  than  a  great 
popular  preacher.  He  was  a  man  of  great  thoughts  and 
far-seeing  plans  and  definite  and  courageous  convictions 
based  on  learning  and  experience  and  study.  He  was 
ready  for  Oxford  at  fifteen.  He  was  but  twenty-three 
when  the  germ  of  the  principle  of  universal  toleration 
seems  to  have  taken  possession  of  him,  apparently  evolved 
from  within,  which  in  time  became  the  great  enthusiasm 
of  his  life.  At  the  same  age  he  began  to  preach.  The 
first  of  his  religious  works  came  a  few  years  later, 
and  No  Cross,  No  Crown  immediately  followed.  The 
erudition  displayed  by  one  so  young  was  a  surprise  to 
friends  and  enemies  alike.  Thus,  at  the  age  when  the 
average  American  youth  is  finishing  college,  Penn  had 
collected  a  wonderful  store  of  knowledge,  could  command 
an  effective  English  style,  and  was  a  master  of  theological 
argument  of  a  most  serviceable  quality. 

His  development  was  continuous.  His  work  on  con 
stitutions  prior  to  his  American  experiment  betrays  the 
thoughtful  student  of  the  best  that  had  been  written  in 
the  past.  He  always  had  great  conceptions  and  projects. 
In  1693  he  published  his  scheme  for  "An  European 
Dyet,  Parliament  or  Estates,"  to  which  disputes  between 
nations  should  be  referred.  All  the  great  Powers  were 
to  be  represented.  The  advantages  of  such  a  court, 
and  the  means  to  make  its  decisions  acceptable,  in  order 
to  avoid  wars,  were  presented  with  great  wealth  of 


CH.  ii  WILLIAM   PENN   IN  PENNSYLVANIA    431 

argument  and  illustration.  The  Hague  tribunal  was 
there  in  embryo. 

Three  years  later,  he  published  a  plan  for  the  union 
of  the  American  Colonies.  Two  representatives  of  each 
province  were  to  meet  in  New  York  to  arrange  matters 
of  common  interest.  They  were  to  settle  questions 
concerning  commerce,  the  return  of  criminals,  and 
"  consider  ways  and  means  to  support  the  union  and 
safety  of  these  provinces  against  the  public  enemies." 
This  was  probably  the  first  suggestion  of  the  movement 
which  culminated  about  a  century  later  in  the  Federal 
Constitution  and  Union. 

But  the  greatest,  and  at  the  same  time,  most  practical 
conception  was  the  foundation  of  Pennsylvania  itself. 
That  there  were  errors  in  detail,  none  can  doubt  An 
absentee  landlord,  even  though  liberal,  can  hardly  avoid 
criticism  and  opposition,  and  such  was  William  Penn  to 
his  Colony.  His  forceful  presence  would  undoubtedly 
have  composed  faction  and  removed  difficulties,  and  it 
was  his  full  purpose  to  have  lived  permanently  in 
Pennsylvania.  The  idea  of  a  Commonwealth  devoted 
to  liberty  and  peace  drew  out  the  best  powers  of  a 
comprehensive  and  enthusiastic  intellect.  There  was  no 
room  in  Europe,  but  in  the  great  unoccupied  expanse  of 
the  New  World  he  would  carry  out  his  ideals  with  a 
selected  community  in  sympathy  with  them,  of  a  serious 
and  honest  sort,  to  whom  he  would  transfer  the  govern 
mental  power  and  realty  rights  he  had  purchased  of 
the  Crown,  reserving  only  such  moderate  share  of  each 
as  security  for  the  future  and  family  interests  would 
justify.  It  was  a  glorious  conception  and  a  no  less 
glorious  opportunity,  and  we  find  him  continually  temper 
ing  his  natural  ardour  by  considerations  of  duty  to  God 
and  man,  as  the  seriousness  of  the  task  and  the  risks 
of  failure  pressed  themselves  upon  him. 

There  was,  too,  in  his  composition  a  good  share  of 
fighting  spirit.  He  was  to  have  difficulties,  but  he  never 
quailed.  The  temper  which  declared  that  he  would  never 
yield  a  jot,  even  though  he  died  in  prison,  served  him  in 


432    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

good  stead  in  other  contests.  "  Can  my  wicked  enemies 
yet  bow  ?  They  shall,  or  break,  or  be  broken  in  pieces 
before  a  year  from  this  time  comes  about,  and  my  true 
friends  rejoice,"  he  declared  in  a  crisis  with  Lord  Baltimore. 
"If  lenitives  will  not  do,  coercives  must  be  tried,"  he 
announced  in  another  emergency.  It  was  only  this 
determined  vigour  which  carried  him  through  the  vast 
heap  of  difficulties  among  which  he  struggled. 

The  whole  of  Penn's  life  indicates  the  power  of  his 
personality.  Where  he  was  present,  events  shaped  them 
selves  towards  his  purposes.  At  the  court  of  Charles  II., 
of  James  II.,  and  of  Anne,  he  had  surprising  influence. 
This  is  all  the  more  remarkable  because  his  Quaker 
scruples  in  certain  respects  must  have  removed  him  far 
from  the  ordinary  courtier.  We  may  assume  that  his 
dress,  while  simple,  was  comely  ;  that  his  speech,  while 
observing  the  limitations  of  his  sect,  was  well  chosen, 
pleasing  and  appreciative  of  the  point  of  view  of  his 
associates  ;  that  his  manners,  while  devoid  of  the  flattering 
postures  and  phrases  of  the  day,  were  never  offensive. 
It  is  only  thus  that  we  can  explain  what  seems  his 
general  friendliness  with  royalty  and  nobility.  "  I  know 
of  no  religion,"  he  says,  "  that  destroys  courtesy,  civility 
and  kindness,"  and  these  qualities,  together  with  a  con 
versation  full  of  interesting  matter  and  a  ready  wit,  seem 
to  have  made  him  generally  acceptable.  So  it  was  that 
he  interceded  successfully  at  court,  not  only  for  hundreds 
of  persecuted  Friends,  but  for  Anglican  bishops,  political 
refugees,  and  suffering  scholars,  as  well  as  crowds  of 
needy  suitors  of  humbler  rank. 

It  was  for  these  purposes,  and  to  counteract  the 
influence  of  Lord  Baltimore  in  the  matter  of  the  boundary 
line,  efforts  which  never  failed  of  success,  that  he  felt 
impelled  to  remain  so  much  in  England.  Again  and 
again  he  hoped  to  come  to  Pennsylvania,  but  the  demands 
of  Friends  and  the  exactions  of  Ford  kept  him  at  home. 
Only  two  visits  of  less  than  two  years  each,  all  too  short 
for  the  work  to  be  done,  was  he  able  to  make  to  his 
province. 


CH.II  WILLIAM  PENN  IN   PENNSYLVANIA    433 

His  personal  influence  was  no  less  marked  among  his 
colonists.  When  present,  faction  was  stilled,  the  Indians 
were  pacified,  desirable  legislation  was  effected,  and  under 
his  ministry  the  meetings  settled  down  into  quietness  and 
harmony.  Could  he  have  longer  remained,  another 
history  would  have  been  written.  Perhaps  it  was  well 
that  in  the  tutelage  of  the  colony  it  should  have  been 
left  to  its  own  responsibility,  and  have  found  its  way 
through  confusion  to  liberty.  For  had  the  compelling 
influence  of  its  founder  been  continually  present,  a 
heroic  figure  among  his  friends,  certain  aristocratic  features 
and  social  customs  might  have  been  engrafted  on  the 
government  less  favourable  to  liberty  than  such  as 
were  worked  out  through  the  stress  of  partisan  conflict. 
Whether  we  sympathise  with  David  Lloyd  or  William 
Penn  in  the  struggle  between  them,  we  may  accord  to 
each  of  them  a  potent  influence  in  shaping  the  free 
government  which  grew  out  of  the  troubled  early  years 
of  the  experiment. 

There  are  many  traditions  of  his  life  in  America : 
how  he  outjumped  the  Indians,  and  gained  their  lasting 
regard ;  the  great  treaty  immortalised  by  Clarkson  in 
history,  by  West  on  the  canvas,  and  by  Voltaire  in  happy 
phrase ;  the  open  house  at  Pennsbury,  where  in  feudal 
style  he  generously  entertained  red  man  and  white, 
politician  and  minister  alike ;  his  "  walks "  with  the 
Indians  and  the  regard  he  showed  for  their  prejudices 
and  customs  ;  how  on  his  way  to  Haverford  Meeting 
he  took  upon  his  horse  little  Rebecca  Wood,  and  carried 
her  with  him  to  the  Meeting,  her  bare  feet  dangling  on 
either  side ;  how  at  Merion  a  little  boy,  curious  to  see 
the  great  Governor,  peeped  through  a  hole  in  the  door 
of  his  chamber,  and  saw  him  on  his  knees  returning 
thanks  that  he  had  been  provided  for  in  the  wilderness. 
There  is  probably  more  or  less  truth  in  all  of  these. 
They  show  that  in  a  little  time  something  of  a  halo 
gathered  around  his  name,  and  his  little  acts  became 
significant,  a  sure  evidence  of  influence. 

We  may  make  such  surmises  as  we  will  concerning  the 

2  F 


434    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

extent  of  the  influence  of  William  Penn  upon  Pennsylvania 
Quakerism,  based  on  his  character  and  standing.  The 
Meeting  minutes  make  but  limited  reference  to  him.  In 
1683  a  plan,  doubtless  originating  in  William  Penn's 
comprehensive  mind,  was  presented  to  the  meeting  : 

"  It  being  desired  to  hold  a  general  Meeting  of  Friends  from 
New  England  to  Carolina,  the  Meeting  appoints :  William  Penn, 
Christopher  Taylor,  Samuel  Jenings,  James  Harrison,  Thomas 
Olive,  Mahlon  Stacy,  to  make  arrangements  by  writing  to 
Friends  or  speaking,  and  inform  London  Yearly  Meeting." 

What  difficulties  prevented  the  realisation  of  this 
project  for  nationalising  the  Society  of  Friends,  we  do 
not  know.  They  were  probably  material,  rather  than 
political.  What  different  development  would  have 
resulted  is  also  a  matter  of  conjecture.  Something  of 
the  same  idea  occurred  to  certain  Yearly  Meetings  about 
two  hundred  years  later. 

In  1700,  on  the  occasion  of  Penn's  second  visit,  we 
have  a  record  of  certificates  concerning  him  being  received 
from  Bristol,  London,  and  Horsham.  In  the  same  year, 
"  Governor  Penn  "  was  appointed  on  a  committee  to  draw 
up  the  epistle  to  London  Yearly  Meeting.  The  next 
year  the  following  minute  was  adopted : 

"Our  Governor,  William  Penn,  having  said  before  this 
Meeting  that  he  entends  for  England,  and  desires  that  they 
would  appoint  ten  or  twelve  Friends  to  meet  him  this  evening 
upon  some  weighty  occasion,  in  order  thereunto,  Samuel 
Jenings  [and  fifteen  others]  and  such  public  Friends  as  have 
freedom,  are  desired  to  meet  the  Governor  accordingly  about 
six  this  evening." 

This  meeting  is  probably  referred  to  in  the  letter  of 
Isaac  Norris,  already  quoted.  No  other  references  to 
him  appear  on  the  Yearly  Meeting  minutes.  We  may 
safely  assume,  however,  that  he  was  an  important  figure 
in  any  meeting  which  he  attended. 

In  the  minutes  of  Philadelphia  Monthly  Meeting,  there 
are  evidences  of  his  interest  in  the  details  of  society  work 
and  his  name  appears  occasionally.  On  Eleventh-month 
1st,  1683  (January  1684): 


CH.II   WILLIAM  PENN  IN  PENNSYLVANIA     435 

"  A  letter  of  advice  from  the  Governor  was  read  to  Friends 
counselling  them  to  be  careful  in  their  behaviour  for  Truth's 
sake,  that  so  the  Lord  might  not  be  dishonoured  and  the  Truth 
evilly  spoken  of  amongst  wicked  men." 

Again  on  Sixth-month  (August)  5th,  1684  : 

"  The  Governor  being  present,  and  his  departure  for  England 
drawing  nigh,  he  moved  the  Meeting  to  give  him  a  certificate 
as  touching  his  demeanour  amongst  the  people  of  his  province, 
which  was  taken  into  consideration  by  the  Meeting." 

And  later  in  the  same  Meeting  : 

"A  certificate  was  drawn  up  in  the  Meeting  according  to 
the  motion  of  the  Governor,  and  subscribed  by  Thomas  Lloyd 
[and  fifteen  others]  in  the  name  of  the  Meeting." 

During  his  second  visit,  he  expressed  to  the  Meeting 
a  "  concern  "  that  religious  work  should  be  done  among 
the  negroes  and  Indians.  Acting  on  this  the  Friends 
appointed  a  Monthly  Meeting  for  negroes  to  which  their 
masters  were  to  send  them,  and  "  be  present  with  them 
at  said  meetings  as  frequent  as  may  be."  It  was  also 
agreed  that  when  Indians  are  in  town  they  be  invited  to 
a  meeting  "  when  our  Governor  is  willing  to  speak  to 
them." 

He  worked  on  ordinary  committees,  as  in  the  case  of 
the  widow  of  Thomas  Lloyd,  who  thought  that  the 
executors  of  his  will  had  not  treated  her  fairly.  The 
Governor  being  present  on  another  occasion,  "  readily 
condescended "  to  give  the  materials  of  the  meeting 
house,  erected  where  the  City  Hall  now  is,  to  another  in 
a  more  accessible  part  of  the  city. 

When  he  left  in  1701,  never  to  return,  though  he  and 
they  hoped  otherwise,  another  cordial  and  loving  certifi 
cate  drawn  up  by  Thomas  Story,  Samuel  Carpenter,  and 
Griffith  Owen,  was  given  him. 

The  personality  of  William  Penn  may  well  be  assumed 
to  be  the  most  potent  influence  in  the  early  history  of 
Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting.  His  advantages  of  birth, 
fortune,  and  education,  his  superior  intellectual  and  moral 
powers,  his  position  as  originator  of  the  conception  which 


436    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

had  given  to  all  its  members  their  worldly  and  religious 
opportunities,  his  authority  as  Governor  and  proprietor, 
would  in  any  community  have  endowed  him  with  a 
towering  ascendency.  But  when  to  these  are  added  a 
humility  in  religious  affairs,  which  asked  and  would  allow 
no  precedence,  a  record  of  faithful  adherence  to  principle, 
through  losses  and  imprisonments,  and  an  endowment  of 
a  prophetic  gift  of  remarkable  fervour  and  power,  there 
is  no  need  to  doubt  that  whenever  his  gracious  presence 
could  be  felt,  nothing  could  ever  compare  with  it.  Even 
in  his  absence,  his  words  and  memory  and  spirit  hovered 
over  his  province  in  its  religious  life,  and  became,  long 
after  his  death,  its  inspiration  and  guide. 


CHAPTER    III 

EARLY    DAYS THE    KEITH    CONTROVERSY 

PHILADELPHIA  Yearly  Meeting  had  its  origin  in  the 
Monthly  Meeting  of  Burlington,  New  Jersey.  On  the 
second  of  the  3rd  month  "  it  was  unanimously  agreed 
that  a  general  meeting  be  yearly  held  in  Burlington,  the 
first  of  which  to  be  the  28th  of  Sixth  month  1681." 
This  was  the  first  session  of  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting. 
It  decreed  that  women's  meetings  should  be  held  monthly 
at  the  same  time  as  the  men's. 

The  next  year,  1682,  a  large  number  of  Friends 
having  come  to  Philadelphia,  an  organisation  was  there 
effected.  These  "  Friends  of  God "  agreed  to  meet 
monthly  and  make  every  third  meeting  a  Quarterly 
Meeting.  General  Meetings  were  also  held  both  at 
Burlington  and  Philadelphia.  The  latter  in  1684  was 
attended  by  representatives  from  Rhode  Island  and  from 
Maryland  in  accordance  with  William  Penn's  com 
prehensive  plan  already  mentioned.  Epistles  were  sent 
to  London  and  to  Carolina,  Virginia,  Maryland,  and 
New  England  : 

"That  it  may  be  presented  to  them  if  possible  from  these 
remote  provinces  they  may  send  two  or  three  for  each  province 
to  our  Yearly  Meeting  here  being  as  a  center  or  middle  part 
that  so  communion  and  blessed  union  may  be  preserved 
among  all." 

This  duplication  of  General  Meetings  in  the  case  of 
Friends  so  closely  associated  as  those  in  New  Jersey  and 
Pennsylvania  seemed  undesirable,  and  in  1685  it  was 
concluded  to  hold  them  in  the  future  alternately  in 

437 


438    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

Burlington  and  Philadelphia,  beginning  at  Burlington  in 
1686.  This  arrangement  continued  till  1760,  when  it 
was  decided  that  all  the  Yearly  Meetings  should  be  held 
in  Philadelphia. 

The  territory  embraced  in  the  Yearly  Meeting  in 
early  times  included  the  settled  portions  of  New  Jersey 
and  Pennsylvania  and  the  northern  parts  of  Delaware  and 
Maryland  and  also  some  meetings  in  Virginia.  Later 
the  whole  eastern  shore  of  the  Chesapeake  was  given  to 
Philadelphia,  and  the  Virginia  meetings  and  others  on 
the  west  side  of  the  Susquehanna  both  in  Maryland  and 
Pennsylvania  were  transferred  to  Baltimore. 

While  in  local  matters  the  American  meetings  were 
supreme  each  within  its  limits,  they  all  paid  great  respect 
to  the  letters  of  George  Fox  and  the  official  epistles  of 
London  Yearly  Meeting.  These  were  both  doctrinal  and 
practical,  stating  the  theory  of  the  meeting  for  worship, 
setting  up  the  church  machinery,  giving  directions  as  to 
the  treatment  of  delinquents  and  of  the  poor,  advice  as 
to  business,  dress,  and  language,  and  a  multitude  of  other 
details.  One  can  find  practically  the  whole  of  formal 
Quakerism  as  it  existed  for  two  centuries  in  these  early 
epistles.  They  are  a  wonderful  tribute  to  the  genius  of 
the  Founder,  whose  followers  in  after  years  were  almost 
too  faithful  in  their  allegiance.  Occasionally  there  was 
a  ripple  of  discontent,  as  John  Burnyeat  found  in  Long 
Island  in  167 'i.1  But  such  rebellion  became  in  a  little 
time  evidence  of  "  a  wrong  spirit "  wherever  it  cropped 
out.  The  volume  of  these  advices  became  in  time  so 
large  that  in  1703  a  committee  of  the  Yearly  Meeting 
was  appointed  to  codify  them,  and  thus  was  established 
the  Discipline  which  became  obligatory  upon  all  the 
meetings.  The  earliest  draft  of  a  discipline,  adversely 
called  Canons  and  Institutions,  was  the  work  of  Fox  and 
others,  and  was  issued  in  London  in  1668.  In  a  little 
time  these  foreign  regulations  and  advices  were  replaced 
by  others  of  similar  import  adopted  in  the  Yearly  Meeting 
to  meet  the  various  conditions  as  they  developed. 

1  See  p.  229. 


CH.  in  THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  439 

In  1685  tne  Yearly  Meeting  agreed  that  "  Friends  in 
the  Ministry"  should  meet  at  seven  o'clock  in  the 
morning  prior  to  the  Yearly  or  General  Meeting.  Elders 
had  not  yet  been  created,  but  this  was  probably  the 
origin  of  "  the  meeting  of  ministers  and  elders "  which 
has  been  carried  through  all  the  subsequent  history. 

The  first  business  meeting  held  in  Philadelphia  was 
opened  by  this  minute  : 

"The  Friends  of  God  belonging  in  Philadelphia  in  the 
province  of  Pennsylvania  being  met  in  the  fear  and  power  of  the 
Lord  at  the  present  meeting-house  in  the  said  city  the  Ninth 
Day  of  the  Eleventh  Month  being  the  third  day  of  the  week  in 
the  year  1682  l — They  did  take  into  their  serious  consideration 
the  settlement  of  meetings  therein  for  the  affairs  and  services 
of  the  Truth  according  to  that  goodly  and  comely  practise  and 
example  which  they  had  received  and  enjoyed  with  true 
satisfaction  among  their  friends  and  brethren  in  the  land  of 
their  nativity  and  did  then  and  there  agree  that  the  first  Third 
Day  in  the  week  in  every  month  shall  hereafter  be  the  monthly- 
meeting  day  for  men's  and  women's  meeting  for  the  affairs  and 
service  of  the  Truth  in  this  city  and  county  and  every  third 
meeting  shall  be  Quarterly  Meeting  of  the  same." 

They  agreed  to  build  a  meeting-house,  and  to  buy 
the  necessary  books  ;  they  advised  that  all  Friends  bring 
certificates  ;  they  arranged  for  a  record  of  deaths,  the  care 
of  the  poor,  and  the  sanction  of  marriages,  which  were 
very  numerous. 

Succeeding  meetings  decreed  that  ministering  Friends 
should  gain  the  sanction  of  their  Monthly  Meetings  ;  that 
these  bodies  should  severely  look  after  those  who  spread 
false  reports  ;  that  Friends  should  not  go  to  law  with  each 
other  until  an  attempt  had  been  made  by  the  meeting  to 
settle  the  dispute  ;  and  that  wrongdoing  of  various  sorts 
should  be  closely  attended  to. 

The  first  Friend  who  came  to  Pennsylvania  to  reside 
was  probably  Robert  Wade.  He  had  emigrated  in  1675 
from  England  to  Salem,  New  Jersey,  and  within  a  year 
crossed  the  Delaware  River  and  occupied  the  Essex 
House,  the  residence  of  the  old  Swedish  governors,  in 

1  gth  January  1683.     The  year  began  ist  March. 


440    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.V 

Upland,  now  Chester.  At  this  house,  on  Eleventh  Month 
loth,  1 68 1,  the  first  session  of  Chester  Monthly  Meeting 
was  held.  The  Friends  of  Burlington  seem  to  have  exer 
cised  some  supervisory  care  over  this  meeting.  William 
Penn  occupied  the  same  house  when  he  landed  in  1682, 
and  here  also  met  the  first  assembly  of  Pennsylvania. 
Also  prior  to  the  arrival  of  Penn  a  number  of  New 
Jersey  Friends  had  crossed  the  river  at  Burlington  and 
settled  the  Falls  Meeting  in  Bucks  County. 

When  the  province  was  divided  into  the  three  counties, 
Philadelphia,  Chester,  and  Bucks,  three  Quarterly  Meetings, 
coterminous  with  the  counties,  were  established,  while 
Monthly  Meetings  were  pushed  out  into  the  woods  to 
meet  the  rapidly  growing  needs  of  the  immigrant  population. 

The  early  minutes  of  the  meetings  betray  a  great 
anxiety  to  live  up  to  the  standard  of  Fox  and  his 
friends  in  England.  Within  a  few  years  after  1682  such 
subjects  as  the  following,  selected  almost  at  random,  were 
considered. 

A  member  was  disciplined  for  passing  money  "  not 
current "  ;  again  and  again  were  the  evils  of  giving  rum 
to  the  Indians  pointed  out,  and  Friends  urged  against  it ; 
they  were  urged  to  attend  to  the  wants  of  the  poor  outside 
their  borders  ;  not  to  buy  "  hog-bells  "  of  the  Indians,  who 
had  probably  stolen  them  ;  they  arranged  their  meetings 
so  as  not  to  interfere  with  "the  court,"  for  the  same 
Friends  were  influential  in  both  ;  they  set  up  schools,  at 
first  in  the  meeting-houses,  afterwards  near  by,  both  for 
girls  and  boys  ;  they  laboured  with  a  man  who  wanted  a 
certificate  for  marriage  "  for  the  extravagant  powdering  of 
his  periwig,"  and  made  him  promise  to  be  more  moderate. 
Every  matter  connected  with  morals  or  conduct  was  a 
proper  matter  for  inquiry  and  church  legislation.  "  To 
clear  Truth  "  was  given  as  the  object  of  any  disavowal  of 
loose  living,  but  reformation  rather  than  rejection  was 
persistently  sought  for  the  offender. 

The  large  majority  of  the  settlers  were  Englishmen, 
mostly  yeomen.  They  had  bought  their  lands  of  Penn 
from  rough  maps  before  leaving  England,  at  the  very 


CH.  m          THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  441 

moderate  price  which  he  asked  of  £100  for  5000 
acres  or  smaller  tracts  in  proportion,  with  a  quit -rent 
annually  of  one  shilling  for  each  hundred  acres.  This 
enabled  many  a  poor  English  renter  to  become  a  land 
owner  in  Pennsylvania,  and,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  these 
farmers  greatly  prospered,  though  Penn  had  difficulty  in 
collecting  his  quit- rents.  The  meeting-houses  a  few  miles 
apart  through  the  settled  country  were  the  first  concern 
after  the  necessities  of  living  were  provided  for,  and  the 
machinery  of  the  church  was  easily  constructed  after  the 
George  Fox  model.  While  a  number  of  Friends  of 
education  and  means  found  homes  in  Philadelphia,  the 
Yearly  Meeting  was  essentially  rural  in  its  characteristics. 
This  fact  and  the  absence  of  any  provision  for  higher 
education  created  a  steady,  conservative  community,  per 
petuating  its  type  from  one  generation  to  another. 

Two  other  elements  of  the  population  must  be 
considered.  On  the  26th  of  the  Fifth  Month  (July)  1683, 
having  narrowly  escaped  capture  by  a  Turkish  pirate, 
landed  Francis  Daniel  Pastorius  and  Thomas  Lloyd, 
representatives  and  leaders  of  little  bands  of  Germans 
and  Welsh  respectively.  They  were  both  well  educated, 
but  Latin  was  the  only  language  they  had  in  common. 

Pastorius,  the  Pennsylvania  Pilgrim  of  Whittier,  had 
been  a  Mennonite.  But  he  and  his  friends,  after  settling 
in  Germantown,  were  identified  with  Friends.  We  find 
him  appointed  on  committees  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  and 
his  Monthly  Meeting  was  recognised  as  a  definite  branch. 
In  1688  this  Monthly  Meeting  sent  up  a  celebrated  protest 
against  slavery : 

"There  is  a  liberty  of  conscience  here  which  is  right  and 
reasonable,  and  there  ought  to  be  likewise  liberty  of  the  body, 
except  for  evil-doers,  which  is  another  case.  But  to  bring  men 
hither,  or  to  rob  and  sell  them  against  their  will,  we  stand  against." 

The  Yearly  Meeting  deferred  action,  but  the  seed  was 
sown. 

The  Mennonites  and  other  German  sects,  as  well  as 
the  little  Quaker  community  of  Criesheim,  were  drawn 


442    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.V 

to  Pennsylvania  by  similarity  of  doctrine  and  practice 
with  the  Friends.  They  knew  of  Friends  through  the 
visits  of  William  Penn  and  George  Fox  to  the  Rhine 
Valley,  and  the  contemporaneous  spread  of  Reformation 
principles  in  Germany  and  England.  While  but  few  of 
them  followed  the  example  of  Pastorius  in  joining  in 
membership,  they  were  always  sympathetic  and  doctrinally 
and  politically  closely  associated  with  Friends.  Their 
great  leader,  Christopher  Sauer,  became  a  powerful  ally 
of  Quakerism  in  all  good  works.  The  later  immigration 
of  German  Reformed  and  Lutheran,  driven  from  the 
Palatinate  by  the  ravages  of  war,  had  less  in  common 
with  the  Friends,  but  up  to  the  Revolutionary  War  were 
quite  willing  to  permit  the  civil  ascendency  of  the  Friends 
to  remain  unchallenged. 

The  friends  of  Thomas  Lloyd  were  more  definitely 
in  the  fold.  He  himself  became  the  great  leader  of 
Pennsylvania  Friends,  in  the  absence  of  William  Penn,  in 
all  affairs  of  Church  and  State,  until  his  lamented  death 
at  the  age  of  forty-five  in  1694. 

Quakerism  had  started  in  Wales  when  John  ap  John 
in  1653  was  sent  as  a  "  tryer  "  to  hear  George  Fox  preach. 
It  suited  him,  and  he  became  its  great  apostle.  Joined 
with  him  were  Richard  Davies,  and  also  Charles  and 
Thomas  Lloyd,  university  men  of  high  social  position. 
Nowhere  was  persecution  more  severe.  The  old  Briton 
blood,  which  boasted  that  it  had  never  been  conquered 
by  Roman  or  Norman,  did  not  quail.  They  stood  it  all 
heroically,  and  when  William  Penn  offered  them  a  haven  of 
rest  they  found  an  honourable  way  of  escaping  the  trials 
which  seemed  practically  endless.  But  they  loved  their 
old  country,  its  language  and  customs,  and  a  committee  of 
them  obtained  from  William  Penn  the  offer  of  a  "  Barony," 
where  they  could  have  a  new  Wales,  and,  as  they  hoped, 
a  government  of  their  own,  unmixed  with  alien  influences. 
They  came  in  great  numbers.  Their  Barony  of  40,000 
acres,  now  a  beautiful  suburb  of  Philadelphia,  was  assigned 
them,  and  the  old  names  along  the  Pennsylvania  Railroad 
keep  alive  its  traditions. 


CH.  in  THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  443 

It  was  impossible  to  give  them  a  complete  government 
and  complete  possession  of  the  soil.  Saxon  ideas  would 
creep  in,  and  Saxon  men  would  marry  their  daughters, 
and  while  their  countrymen  at  home  retained  the  Welsh 
customs,  in  a  generation  or  two  they  were  lost  in  Penn 
sylvania.  A  political  governor  ran  a  county  line  through 
their  tract,  and  divided  their  state  interests.  The  Chester 
County  Friends  tried  to  divert  all  on  their  side  of  the  line 
from  Philadelphia  Quarterly  Meeting,  but  in  this  they 
failed.  They  did,  however,  succeed  in  stopping  the 
growth  of  new  meetings  which  would  not  be  under  their 
supervision  in  the  Chester  territory.  Thus  the  powers, 
both  civil  and  ecclesiastical,  conspired  to  break  their 
unity.  But  their  vigour  and  industry  made  the  Welsh 
tract  the  garden  spot  of  the  province,  and  many  a  family, 
illustrious  in  colony  and  state,  started  here. 

They  were  not  all  Friends  when  they  arrived.  A 
group  of  sober  people  settled  in  "  North  Wales,"  outside 
the  Barony.  They  heard  of  their  compatriots  in  Haver- 
ford  and  Merion,  and  sent  a  delegation  to  investigate. 
The  report  was  reassuring,  and  John  Richardson,  who 
visited  their  meeting  in  1 702,  says  they  were  "  a  fine 
tender  people,  but  few  understanding  English."  They 
were  not  then  in  membership  with  Friends,  but  recogni 
tion  soon  followed. 

The  first  settlers  sent  back  good  reports  to  their  friends 
in  England,  Wales,  and  Germany.  They  told  of  the  fertile 
lands  to  be  purchased  cheaply,  of  the  kindly  natives,  of  the 
easy  government,  and,  more  than  all,  of  the  possibility  of 
worship  as  they  felt  to  be  right  without  hindrance  from 
the  state,  or  supercilious  disregard  on  the  part  of  an  estab 
lished  church.  Multitudes  flocked  in  during  these  early 
days,  mostly  Friends,  and  the  meetings  grew  rapidly  in 
size  and  number. 

In  1683,  within  five  months  of  Penn's  landing,  a  group 
of  Friends  could  write  to  their  brethren  at  home  : 

"  In  Pennsylvania  there  is  one  [meeting]  at  Falls,  one  at  the 
Governor's  House,  one  at  Colchester  River,  all  in  the  county  of 
Bucks;  one  at  Tawcony,  one  at  Philadelphia,  both  in  that  county; 


444    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

one  at  Darby  at  John  Blunston's,  one  at  Chester,  one  at  Ridley 
at  J.  Simcock's,  and  one  at  Wm.  Ruse's  at  Chichester,  in  Cheshire. 
.  .  .  And  for  our  outward  conditions  as  men,  blessed  be  God, 
we  are  satisfied ;  the  countries  are  good,  the  land,  the  water,  the 
air — room  enough  for  many  thousands  to  live  plentifully.  .  .  . 

"  Dear  Friends  and  Brethren,  we  have  no  cause  to  murmur,  our 
lot  is  fallen  every  way  in  a  goodly  place,  and  the  love  of  God  is, 
and  growing,  among  us,  and  we  are  a  family  at  peace  within 
ourselves,  and  truly  great  is  our  joy  therefor." 

There  are  many  testimonies  to  this  delightful  peace 
and  harmony  of  the  early  days.  In  1684  they  write  to 
their  friends  in  London  : 

"  At  the  two  aforementioned  General  Meetings  [in  Burlington 
and  Philadelphia]  we  had  such  a  blessed  harmony  together  that 
we  may  say  we  know  not  that  there  was  a  jarring  string  amongst 
us.  A  great  multitude  came  of  many  hundreds,  and  the  gospel 
bell  made  a  most  blessed  sound.  There  was  the  men's  and 
women's  meeting  in  both  places  in  their  precious  services  to 
inspect  into  Truth's  matters  in  what  related  to  them ;  and  God 
gave  them  wisdom  to  do  it,  and  all  was  unanimous." 

They  expected  still  more  in  the  future : 

"  The  majesty  of  Truth  is  great  here,  and  does  prevail  and 
grow.  .  .  .  Yea  it  will  increase  more  and  more  to  the  ends  of 
America.  The  day  of  its  great  visitation  is  come,  and  his  great 
power  and  holy  authority  is  rolling  hither  like  the  inundation  and 
breaking  and  overflowing  of  waters." 

One  could  hardly  suppose  it  to  be  otherwise.  The 
men  who  had  through  deep  conviction  joined  a  persecuted 
and  despised  sect,  who  had  endured  the  discipline  of 
English  jails,  and  who  had  expatriated  themselves  for  the 
sake  of  conscience,  were  not  bitter,  suspicious  men.  Their 
Divine  communion  was  very  real,  their  human  communion 
was  very  sweet.  When  they  met  together  in  these  early 
days,  full  of  thanks  for  the  blessings  of  peace  and  liberty, 
needing  no  words  to  draw  their  hearts  together  in  silent 
worship  of  their  ever  near  Master,  their  feelings  were  too 
deep  and  sincere  for  anything  but  love  and  unity. 

But  the  second  generation  had  had  no  such  discipline. 
Some  of  them  caught  the  spirit  of  their  fathers  and  some 


CH.  in  THE  KEITH   CONTROVERSY  445 

did  not.  They  were  no  longer  all  melted  together  in 
spiritual  sympathy,  and  a  place  was  found  for  division 
whenever  the  occasion  arose.  This  occasion  came  in  the 
person  of  George  Keith. 

He  was  born  in  Scotland  about  1638  and  educated 
as  a  Presbyterian.  He  studied  at  the  University  of 
Aberdeen,  and  received  the  degree  of  Master  of  Arts 
from  that  institution.  Bishop  Burnet  says  that  he  "  was 
the  most  learned  man  ever  in  the  Quaker  sect,  well 
versed  both  in  Oriental  tongues  and  in  philosophy  and 
mathematics."  About  1663  or  1664  he  joined  Friends, 
and  for  twenty-seven  years  was  in  favour,  sharing  with  the 
other  leaders  of  the  Society  the  full  measure  of  writing, 
public  discussion,  and  persecution.  He  had  the  true  spirit 
of  the  early  Friends.  He  said  in  1665  : 

"  It  lay  upon  me  from  the  Lord  to  depart  from  these  teachers 
who  could  not  point  me  to  the  living  knowledge  of  God  where  I 
could  find  it :  and  I  came  and  heard  men  and  women  who  were 
taught  of  God  who  pointed  me  to  the  true  principle;  and 
though  some  of  them  could  not  read  a  letter  yet  I  found  them 
wiser  than  all  the  teachers  I  ever  formerly  had  been  under." x 

Many  other  of  his  testimonies  are  eloquent  of  the  great 
peace  and  rapturous  joy  that  came  into  his  heart  as  the 
result  of  the  Quaker  teaching  of  God's  direct  communion 
with  men  and  his  own  experience  of  it.  He  found  "  the 
gates  of  the  heavenly  paradise"  opened  in  himself  and 
came  to  have  a  great  love  for  all  mankind.  It  is  un 
necessary  for  our  purpose  to  go  over  the  details  of  his 
early  life.  His  books  and  sufferings  both  betray  the 
unflinching  spirit  of  the  early  Quaker  apostle.  He  had 
his  full  share  of  imprisonments  and  beatings,  which  he 
bore  with  humility.  He  was  especially  effective  in  public 
discussions,  and  vigorously  espoused  his  new  convictions 
before  hostile  audiences  of  Presbyterian  divines.  In  1670 
he  published  his  Benefit,  Advantage  and  Glory  of  Silent 
Meetings,  a  most  sympathetic  treatment  of  the  subject 
written  in  Aberdeen  prison.  "  There  are  immediate 
revelations  now-a-days"  is  the  emphatic  point.  In  1675 

1  Immediate  Revelation,  by  George  Keith,  p.  84. 


446    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

he  debated  in  company  with  Robert  Barclay  the  principles 
of  his  sect  before  the  students  of  the  University  of 
Aberdeen.  He  joined  with  George  Fox,  William  Penn, 
and  Robert  Barclay  in  a  visit  to  Germany,  and  worked  in 
great  unity  with  them.  In  1684  he  came  to  New  Jersey, 
where  as  surveyor  he  laid  out  the  division  line  between 
East  and  West  Jersey.  In  1689,  at  the  opening  of  the 
Friends'  Public  School,  he  was  made  headmaster,  but 
gave  it  up  in  a  year,  finding  that  his  abilities  needed  freer 
scope  than  in  a  school  of  young  boys.  Up  to  this  time 
no  serious  ripple  of  discontent  with  Friends  or  of  Friends 
with  him  seems  to  have  appeared. 

There  now  began  to  come  out  in  his  sermons  and 
discourses  certain  doctrinal  views,  which  were  looked 
upon  with  suspicion  by  many  Friends  and  received  with 
enthusiasm  by  others.  He  charged  that  Friends  had  in 
their  preaching  of  the  inward  Christ  neglected  the  outward. 
He  asserted  that  ministers  declared  that  they  could  be 
saved  by  the  Christ  within  them  "  without  anything  else," 
and  hence  that  they  undervalued  the  historic  Christ  and 
the  Scriptures.  When  he  himself  was  asked  whether 
ignorant  men  and  infants  who  had  not  heard  the  New 
Testament  could  not  be  saved,  it  appeared  that  he  had 
adopted  the  principles  of  van  Helmont  of  the  trans 
migration  of  souls,  and  that  these  uninformed  people 
would  have  another  chance  in  the  next  cycle.  He  prob 
ably  did  not  press  this  latter  doctrine,  but  his  followers 
found  in  it  an  acceptable  refuge.  He  made,  too,  a  sharp 
distinction  between  the  human  and  divine  natures  in 
Christ,  and  the  question  was  debated  with  great  acrimony, 
whether  or  not  it  was  the  body  which  was  born  of  Mary 
that  ascended  into  Heaven. 

These  doctrinal  questions  were  mingled  with  others  of 
a  more  practical  nature.  He  charged  a  general  slackness 
in  the  administration  of  the  Discipline.  The  magistrates 
were  often  ministers,  and  in  their  civil  functions  would 
arrest  offenders  by  force  but  without  loss  of  life  or  limb. 
This  Keith  declared  to  be  inconsistent  with  the  profession 
of  non-resistance  of  evil. 


CH.  in  THE   KEITH  CONTROVERSY  447 

In  these  early  days  the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  powers 
were  so  closely  united  in  practice,  if  not  in  theory,  that  it 
was  difficult  to  distinguish  them,  and  disputes  in  one  court 
were  easily  transferred  to  another. 

There  were  doubtless,  owing  to  the  emphasis  Friends 
placed  on  inspiration  as  the  sole  endowment  for  the 
ministry,  a  number  of  crude  and  narrow  preachers  among 
them.  The  doctrine  of  direct  divine  leading  unto  all 
truth  was  so  simple  and  had  such  sanction  from  the 
leaders  of  the  Society  that  it  is  not  surprising  that  it 
constituted  for  many  the  one  staple  subject  of  discourse. 
A  scholar  like  George  Keith,  whether  in  general  harmony 
with  them  or  not,  could  not  fail  to  see  the  lack  of 
perspective  and  breadth  of  such  men.  That  there  was  no 
ground  for  his  doctrinal  charges  would  be  difficult  to 
maintain.  That  Friends  denied  the  offices  and  failed  to 
recognise  the  divinity  of  the  Christ  of  Judea  was  in 
answer  to  his  challenge  emphatically  contradicted  by 
official  assertions  both  in  Pennsylvania  and  London. 
The  Friends  across  the  water  sent  a  special  message 
urging  a  full  acceptance  of  the  biblical  account  of  Christ, 
while  not  weakening  in  the  least  in  their  belief  that  the 
light  of  Christ  reached  all  men  whether  they  had  this 
account  or  not.  The  leading  Philadelphians  issued 
another  paper  defining  their  position  in  full  in  the  same 
strain.  It  was  urged  upon  Keith  that  the  doctrinal 
shortcomings  of  individuals  should  not  be  used  against 
the  Society.  It  was  also  urged  that  for  a  score  of  years 
while  the  same  conditions  existed  he  had  been  a  strong 
defender  of  its  teachings. 

As  late  as  1688,  he  had  published  a  catechism 
teaching  the  doctrine  he  now  attacked,  that  the  inward 
operation  of  the  spirit  of  Christ  was  essential  and  that 
belief  in  these  outward  matters  was  non-essential  but 
greatly  helpful.  In  the  same  year  he  engaged  in  public 
discussions  with  New  England  Independents  to  the  same 
purport,  in  which  his  fierce  and  uncontrolled  temper 
seemed  so  evident  that  some  Friends  became  suspicious 
of  him. 


448    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

It  was  quite  as  much  the  spirit  as  the  doctrine  of 
George  Keith  to  which  the  Friends  objected.  He  loved 
controversy,  and  in  the  days  when  he  was  in  favour  used 
the  severe  language  of  his  time  against  the  opponents  of 
Quakerism.  His  open  arguments  with  Cotton  Mather 
and  other  New  England  divines  left  but  little  to  choose 
between  them  as  to  the  courtesies  of  debate.  But  to  call 
the  leaders  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  by  opprobrious  names, 
to  get  excited  and  angry  in  discussion,  and  to  make 
statements  which  he  had  to  retract,  were  evidences  of 
"  brittleness  "  of  temper,  according  to  his  opponents,  which 
were  inconsistent  with  a  claim  to  spiritual  guidance.  He 
was  evidently  hot-tempered  and  pugnacious.  He  called 
Thomas  Lloyd,  then  Deputy- Governor,  and  a  man  of 
amiable  disposition  and  excellent  abilities  and  education, 
"an  impudent  man  and  a  pitiful  governor,"  challenged 
Lloyd  to  send  him  to  jail,  and  said  that  "  his  back  had 
long  itched  to  be  whipped."  A  magistrate  he  called 
M  an  impudent  rascal,"  and  a  meeting  of  ministers  he  said 
were  "come  together  to  cloak  heresies  and  deceit,  and 
that  there  were  more  damnable  heresies  and  doctrines  of 
devils  among  the  Quakers  than  among  any  profession  of 
Protestants."  l 

It  was  an  age  of  rough  controversy.     His  opponents 

1  Both  in  America  and  in  England  it  was  the  temper  and  spirit  of  Keith  that 
were  objected  to  rather  than  his  doctrines.  In  A  Quaker  Posting,  p.  57,  we 
find  a  letter  dated  2  mo.  27,  1694,  from  Henry  Gouldney,  a  prominent  English 
Friend  : 

"  I  have  little  to  give  thee  account  of ;  the  most  considerable  is  G.  K.'s  being 
here — He  is  not  a  man  governed  wth.  that  meekness  that  becomes  his  Doctrine 
who  puts  a  great  value  upon  the  outward  comeing  of  our  Blessed  Lord  ;  wch.  I 
hope  all  honnest  ffrds.  finds  it  their  duty  to  doe  ;  yet  himselfe  far  from  makeing 
him  a  lively  example  in  meekness  and  humility — ffrds.  have  had  many  private 
meetings  wth.  him,  and  by  them  all,  I  don't  finde  great  hopes  of  his  comeing 
more  near  us  in  spirit.  His  doctrines,  in  the  generall,  are  I  think  owned  by  all 
sound  ffriends,  but  he  seems  to  lay  downe  abt.  7  points  wch.  he  calls  fundimentalls, 
in  any  of  whome,  if  we  disagree  in,  we  cannot  hold  ffellow-ship,  tho  upon  the 
whole,  was  not  his  spirit  wrong,  that  would  easily  be  accomodated — He  takes 
commonly  large  time  in  meetings,  but  mostly  fflat ;  he  has  a  tone  sometimes, 
especially  wn.  on  one  of  his  pticular  points  that  he  huggs  more  than  ordinery, 
that  he  carrys  off  more  lively — My  accnt.  is  in  groese,  tis  to  large  and  beyond  my 
memmorey  to  pticularize — I  hope  it  will  have  one  good  effect,  viz.  the  more 
unitemg  W.  P.  and  G.  W.  who  chieffly  manages  him — the  other  ffrds.  that  came 
from  Pensilvania  appear  far  the  better  spirited.  Men  come  in  unity  of  ffrds  there, 
and  is  so  reed,  here ;  yet  some  caution  upon  them  that  G.  K.  might  not  take 
occation  to  accot.  ffriends  partiall — He  speaks  of  appealing  to  the  yearly  meeting 
and  will  submitt  to  their  judgment  so  far  as  it  agrees  wth.  his,  and  not  otherwise — " 


CH.  in  THE  KEITH   CONTROVERSY  449 

did  not  spare  him.  Possibly  they  better  controlled  their 
temper  in  debate,  but  in  the  title-page  to  one  of  their 
works  written  in  cold  blood  a  little  later  the  author 
speaks  of 

"...  the  apostate  convicted  ...  in  which  his  apostasy  from  the 
Truth  and  enmity  against  it  is  manifested,  his  Deceit  Hypocricie 
and  manifold  prevarications  are  discovered,  his  false  Quotations 
Lyes  and  Forgeries  out  of  the  Quakers  Books  are  detected,  etc." 

and  even  the  courteous  Thomas  Story  calls  him  "that 
contentious  apostate  from  the  Truth  of  God  once  made 
known  to  him." 

Matters  could  not  abide  in  this  state.  Keith  had 
complained  to  the  Ministers'  Meeting  against  William 
Stockdale  charging  him  with  saying  that  Keith  had 
preached  two  Christs.  Stockdale  denied  the  charge,  and 
in  reply  said  that  Keith  had  called  him  "an  ignorant 
heathen."  The  meeting  blamed  them  both  and  tried  to 
make  peace.  But  it  was  too  late.  Thomas  Lloyd  and 
twenty-seven  other  ministers  issued  a  temperate  epistle 
representing  the  troubles  they  had  with  Keith,  earnestly 
appealing  to  him  to  be  reconciled  and  to  lay  down  the 
separate  meeting  which  he  was  then  engaged  in  setting  up, 
and  repudiating  him  as  an  authorised  minister  among 
Friends. 

Keith  had  a  considerable  following  among  the 
Philadelphia  Friends,  including  a  few  who  held  high 
station.  He  organised  his  own  body,  The  Christian 
Quakers,  with  a  discipline  of  its  own.  This  contained 
some  admirable  provisions.  There  are  a  few  copies  in 
existence  of  a  printed  Confession  of  Faith  and  of  manu 
script  "  Queries " 1  which  his  followers  were  probably 
expected  to  sign.  These  ask  whether  in  view  of  the  fact 
that  many  not  really  Friends  have  become  nominal 
members,  there  should  not  be  some  mark  of  distinction 
between  faithful  friends  of  Truth  and  such  formal  pro 
fessors  ;  whether  it  is  not  desirable  to  have  a  personal 
public  Confession  of  Belief,  the  sincerity  of  which  should 

1  One  of  the  original  copies  is  in  possession  of  George  Vaux  of  PhDadelphia, 

2  G 


450    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.V 

be  discerned  by  faithful  Friends  before  recognition  of 
membership  ;  whether  those  whose  lives  do  not  evidence 
their  inward  rectitude  and  spirituality  should  be  admitted 
into  the  fold  of  the  faithful  ;  whether  such  a  purged 
body  would  not  increase  in  discernment  so  that  true 
judgment  could  be  reached  by  the  aid  of  the  Spirit  of 
Truth ;  whether  it  is  not  desirable  that  all  new  members 
should  make  an  open  Confession  of  Faith,  by  answering 
yea  or  nay  to  the  necessary  principles  of  doctrine  as 
propounded  to  them  ;  whether  such  a  confession  and  a 
holy  life  are  not  worth  more  than  the  plain  language  and 
coming  to  meeting ;  whether  all  Friends'  children  should 
not  in  the  same  way  make  confession  and  be  judged  by 
the  spiritually-minded  before  admission  to  membership  ; 
whether  marriage  to  be  sanctioned  should  not  be  between 
faithful  Friends  only ;  whether  the  discipline  should  not  be 
impartially  enforced  against  all,  great  or  small,  who  are 
out  of  the  unity  with  Friends  ;  whether  all  faithful 
Friends  should  not  constitute  the  meetings  for  business  of 
the  church  and  not  the  elders  only ;  whether  a  record 
should  not  be  kept  of  all  faithful  Friends  in  suitable 
books ;  whether  in  such  meetings  of  faithful  Friends 
only  there  would  not  be  an  infallible  spirit  which  would 
enable  them  to  judge  of  the  ministry,  so  as  to  require 
"  sound  knowledge,  experience,  and  spiritual  ability  "  before 
giving  liberty  to  preach  or  pray  in  open  assemblies. 

Some  of  these,  the  recording  of  members  and  of 
ministers,  the  wider  attendance  of  business  meetings,  the 
greater  rigidity  of  the  discipline  against  loose  livers,  and 
of  late  the  partial  abolition  of  birthright  membership 
have  become  accepted  facts.  The  uniformity  of  belief 
through  an  open  individual  endorsement  of  a  set  pro 
position  has  never  been  demanded.  The  queries  of  Keith 
were  an  evidence  of  an  intention  to  have  the  body  made 
up  of  living  spiritual  members  only,  united  in  faith, 
purpose  and  spirit,  under  Divine  guidance  and  influence, 
a  church  rather  than  a  society. 

The  ministry  and  the  magistracy  were  so  associated 
that  Keith  in  one  of  his  pamphlets  laid  himself  open  to 


CH.  in  THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  451 

the  charge  of  sedition  and  disturbance  of  the  peace  by 
reviling  Samuel  Jenings,  who  was  as  an  ecclesiastic 
strongly  opposed  to  Keith,  and  as  a  judge  and  magistrate 
the  author  of  certain  acts  against  privateers  which  Keith 
bitterly  attacked.  The  Grand  Jury  brought  in  a  true  bill, 
and  Keith  and  a  friend  were  fined  five  pounds  each, 
which  fine  was  never  collected.  The  Justices  imposing 
this  fine  were  all  Friends  and  among  Keith's  strongest 
antagonists.  They  said  in  an  explanation  to  the  public 
that  they  would  endure  all  personal  reflections  and  attacks 
upon  their  religious  body  in  quiet,  but  the  pamphlets 
tended  to  revile  State  officials  and  incited  to  oppose  the 
administration  of  Justice. 

William  Bradford,  the  printer  of  the  seditious  pamphlets, 
was  also  indicted,  and  refusing  to  give  bail  was  committed 
to  jail.  The  jailer,  however,  allowed  him  liberty,  and 
wishing  to  make  an  appeal  to  the  court  dated  from 
prison,  he  was  disappointed  to  find  the  jailer  absent  with 
the  key.  As  he  could  not  get  in  he  signed  the  paper 
from  the  entry  outside.  So  fraternally  were  all  things 
conducted  in  those  primitive  days. 

The  trial  of  Bradford  which  followed,  and  which 
resulted  in  a  divided  jury,  is  memorable  as  being  the 
earliest  recognition  of  the  principle  that  the  jury  is  to 
determine  the  seditious  character  of  a  paper  as  well  as  the 
fact  of  issuance  by  the  defendant.  This  principle  is  the 
basis  of  the  liberty  of  the  press  in  all  civilised  countries. 
It  was  laid  down  first  by  five  Quaker  judges  in  a  case 
where  feeling  ran  high,  and  in  which  if  they  had  any 
prejudices  which  would  warp  their  judgment,  they  would 
be  on  the  other  side.1 

These  trials  bring  out  the  prominence  of  ministering 
Friends  in  civil  positions,  a  prominence  to  which  Keith 
and  his  friends  with  some  justice  objected,  but  which 
naturally  resulted  from  the  Friendly  conception  of  the 
absence  of  any  definite  line  of  distinction  between  the 
preachers  as  a  class,  and  the  other  spiritual  members  of 
the  body. 

1  See  Pennypacker's  Colonial  Cases. 


452    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

"  The  Meeting  of  Ministering  Friends  "  and  in  Seventh 
Month  (September)  1692  the  Yearly  Meeting  itself  were 
the  ecclesiastical  courts  into  whose  hands  George  Keith 
now  fell.  The  latter  body  after  a  careful  investigation 
declared  : 

"We  find  it  our  duty  to  join  with  our  brethren  in  their 
testimony  against  that  spirit  of  reviling,  railing,  lying,  slandering, 
and  falsely  accusing  which  hath  risen  and  acted  notoriously  in 
George  Keith  and  his  adherents  which  hath  led  them  into  a 
mischievous  and  hurtful  separation." 

This  paper  is  signed  by  over  200  Friends  beginning 
with  Thomas  Lloyd,  including  Pastorius  and  nearly  all 
those  prominent  in  Church  and  State.1 

Keith  now  became  an  avowed  leader  of  a  new  sect, 
gathered  out  of  the  large  body  of  Friends.  He  set  up 
meetings  in  Philadelphia,  Burlington,  and  Bucks  County. 
His  eloquence,  learning,  and  previous  high  standing 
brought  many  to  his  ranks.  The  denial  of  the  outward 
Christ  was  his  main  subject  of  attack.  In  these  days  he 
had  among  other  public  controversies  one  with  James 
Dickinson,  an  English  minister,  in  which,  according  to 
the  account  of  Dickinson's  companion,  he  was  vanquished 
"  and  went  away  in  great  wrath."  Such  discussions  and 
voluminous  writings  fanned  the  separating  spirit 

It  was  said  many  times  that  Keith's  doctrinal  attacks 
upon  the  main  body  of  Friends  could  be  all  answered  by 
his  own  earlier  writings,  and  after  examining  these  one  is 
inclined  to  think  the  statement  true.  He  had  often 
pleaded  the  sufficiency  of  the  Divine  Light  to  lead  into 
doctrinal  truth,  into  correct  living,  into  right  public 
preaching  and  praying  ;  and  it  is  impossible  to  note  any 
difference  between  his  views  and  those  of  his  friend  and 
fellow-worker  and  sufferer,  Robert  Barclay.  The  charges 
he  now  made  against  the  Philadelphia  Friends  seemed  to 
indicate  a  change  in  himself.  The  main  one,  that  Friends 

1  One  of  the  acts  which  show  the  turbulent  spirit  of  the  times  was  the  erection 
of  a  gallery  opposite  the  minister's  gallery  in  Bank  meeting  by  the  friends  of 
Keith,  for  his  own  use.  Two  of  the  trustees  of  the  meeting  told  them  to  tear  it 
down,  whereupon  they  tore  down  the  old  gallery.  The  account  states  that 
"  Keith,  who  was  present,  laughed  and  expressed  his  satisfaction." 


CH.  HI  THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  453 

considered  the  Light  within  sufficient  "  without  something 
else,"  was  one  to  which  his  own  early  statements  made 
him  quite  as  fairly  liable  to  attack  as  his  opponents. 
But  they  both  asserted  in  positive  terms  the  ordinary 
orthodox  position  as  to  the  outer  Christ  and  the  Scriptures. 
It  seems  impossible  to  reconcile  the  Keith  of  1670  with 
the  Keith  of  1691  and  later.  Of  course  he  had  a  perfect 
right  to  change  his  position  as  to  these  matters,  but  he 
never  fairly  admitted  the  change. 

In  a  public  discussion  Thomas  Lloyd  had  said  that 
one  might  be  saved  without  the  outer  revelation  of  Christ 
if  he  had  had  no  opportunity  to  know  of  it.  But  Keith 
said  that  this  was  impossible,  and  that  if  such  were  Lloyd's 
views  "  he  could  not  own  him  as  a  Christian  brother, 
though  he  might  be  a  devout  heathen."  This  is  hardly 
compatible  with  his  earlier  statement.  "  God  him 
self  ...  is  objectively  manifest  so  that  he  can  be  heard, 
seen,  tasted,  and  felt  if  all  Scripture  words  were  out  of 
our  present  remembrance," l  or  with  many  other  similar 
statements.  In  1670  he  had  defended  Friends  against 
Robert  Gordon,  who  made  against  them  the  same  charges 
he  was  now  preferring  against  the  Philadelphians. 

Early  in  1693,  in  company  with  his  chief  supporter, 
Thomas  Budd,  he  transferred  the  controversy  to  England. 
He  had  not  secured  the  control  of  any  of  the  American 
meetings,  but  his  party,  though  considerable  in  the 
aggregate,  had  been  disowned  by  all  the  regular  organisa 
tions  in  America,  and  now  Samuel  Jenings,  his  most 
active  opponent,  and  Thomas  Duckett  went  to  London 
to  represent  their  meetings  before  the  English  Friends. 
The  case  was  heard  before  the  Yearly  Meeting,  and  un 
fortunately  for  Keith  he  appears  again  to  have  lost  his 
temper.  There  were  conventions  lasting  several  days 
during  which  the  controversy  was  carried  on.  The  meet 
ing  censured  Keith  for  his  publications  and  the  magistrates 
for  proceeding  against  him  at  law,  but  the  final  decision 
on  the  main  charge  was  distinctly  a  disavowal  of  his 
spirit  and  methods : 

1  Immediate  Revelation,  by  George  Keith,  p.  20. 


454    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

"  It  is  the  sense  and  judgment  of  this  meeting  that  the  said 
George  Keith  is  gone  from  the  blessed  unity  of  the  peaceable 
spirit  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  hath  thereby  separated  him 
self  from  the  holy  fellowship  of  the  Church  of  Christ." 

He  appears  to  have  had  a  very  small  following  in 
England.  William  Penn  l  says  in  a  private  letter  dated 
26th  of  loth  mo.  1696  to  Robert  Turner,  who  had  been 
one  of  Penn's  most  trusted  friends,  but  had  joined  the 
Keith  party,  "  not  five  people  in  the  unity  before  he  came 
over  here,  adhere  to  him." '"  The  matter  could  go  no 
further,  and  he  established  himself  in  Turner's  Hall, 
London,  where  he  preached  to  large  companies  eloquent 
sermons  which  were  largely  directed  against  the  teachings 
and  practices  of  Friends.  He  finally  joined  the  Established 
Church  and  ably  argued  its  position  as  to  rites  and 
sacraments.  He  was  taken  into  full  standing  and  ordained 
by  the  Bishop  of  London. 

When  his  followers  in  Pennsylvania  found  that  he  had 
deserted  them,  their  disintegration  began.  A  few  returned 
to  Friends.  More  became  Baptists  and  quite  a  number 
Episcopalians,  following  the  example  of  their  leader. 
They  constituted  an  opposition  element  in  Church  and 
State  for  a  few  years.  The  "  Keithians "  are  heard  of 
in  the  journals  of  Friends  and  the  political  records  of 
the  province  as  active  allies  in  any  movement  attacking 
the  proprietor  and  his  friends,  but  they  were  soon  ignored. 
In  1698  Thomas  Chalkley  could  say  "there  are  many 
large  meetings  of  Friends,  and  the  Lord  prospers  them 
spiritually  and  temporally." 

George  Keith  himself  was  sent  over  in  1702  by  the 
Society  for  Propagating  the  Gospel  in  Foreign  Parts  to 
gather  as  many  as  possible  into  the  Established  Church. 
He  was  received  with  much  favour  by  the  remnants  of 
the  Keithians,  and  claimed  that  he  had  brought  500  of 
them  into  the  true  faith.  He  immediately  began  his 

1  Penn  at  first  was  inclined  to  side  with  Keith.  At  least  this  was  the  report 
which  reached  Pennsylvania.  He  probably  remembered  his  fraternal  relations  of 
earlier  days,  but  when  he  heard  of  Keith's  changed  spirit,  he  repudiated  him  and 
became  the  object  of  virulent  attack.  See  letter  of  Hugh  Roberts  in  Pennsylvania 
Magazine,  xviii.  205. 

8  Pennsylvania  Magazine,  October  1909. 


CH.  in  THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  455 

series  of  public  polemics  of  which  he  was  so  fond, 
challenging  to  debates.  His  old  opponents,  the  Puritans, 
he  now  largely  left  to  their  own  ways,  but  invaded  the 
meetings  of  Friends,  engaging  in  dispute  wherever  he 
could  find  an  antagonist.  His  challenges  were  usually 
accepted,  and  the  victory  seemed  to  lie  upon  the  side 
whose  account  we  read.  In  July  8th  and  pth  1702, 
he  met  in  Lynn,  Massachusetts,  John  Richardson  in 
debate.  Both  Keith  and  Richardson  give  their  impres 
sions  in  their  journals.  Keith  says  he  read  the  "vile 
errors  "  of  Edward  Burrough,  a  prominent  English  Friend, 
to  the  people,  and  heard  the  Quaker  preachers'  "  utter 
abundance  of  falsehoods  and  impertinences  and  gross 
perversions  of  the  Scripture."  Richardson  says  that  he 
told  Keith  that  "he  offered  violence  to  the  sense  and 
understanding  God  had  given  him."  "  I  spoke  in  the 
Lord's  dreadful  power,  and  George  trembled  so  much 
as  I  seldom  ever  saw  any  man  do." 

George  Keith  spent  about  two  years  travelling  back 
and  forth  from  New  Hampshire  to  Carolina,  omitting 
no  opportunity  to  attend  the  meetings  of  Friends,  where 
he  usually  precipitated  an  unpleasant  controversy.  His 
staple  charge  would  be  that  they  asserted  that  the  Light 
of  Christ  within  men  was  sufficient  for  salvation  "  without 
anything  else."  The  answer  would  usually  be  that  they 
believed  all  that  the  Scriptures  said  about  Christ,  but 
that  the  inner  experience  was  the  essential  thing.  He 
also  completely  reversed  himself  on  the  subject  of  water 
baptism  and  the  communion,  arguing  for  them  with 
great  urgency.  He  had  a  collection  of  sentences  from 
George  Fox,  Edward  Burrough,  and  Richard  Claridge, 
which  he  claimed  sustained  his  charges  of  heterodoxy, 
and  this  collection  was  continually  being  increased  by 
the  statements  of  present  preachers,  some  of  which  were 
doubtless  crude  enough. 

He  and  his  friend  William  Bradford,  the  late  authorised 
printer  of  Philadelphia,  who  had  been  tried  for  sedition, 
appear  to  have  secured  the  confinement  in  jail  of  Samuel 
Bownas  on  a  similar  charge.  Bradford  declared  that 


456    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.V 

Bownas  had  uttered  on  Long  Island  in  a  sermon  certain 
malicious  statements  concerning  the  doctrines  and  practice 
of  Episcopalianism,  then  the  established  religion  of  New 
York.  After  great  trouble  they  secured  some  kind  of  a 
verdict,  and  Samuel  Bownas  spent  nearly  a  year  in  jail. 
Afterwards  Keith  and  Bownas,  by  accident  or  design, 
were  frequently  at  the  same  place  holding  meetings  and 
engaging  in  the  public  discussions  which  characterised 
the  times. 

George  Keith  performed  at  least  one  valuable  service. 
He  gives  us  in  his  Journal^  interesting  historical  state 
ments  as  to  the  methods  by  which  Friends  in  those  days 
maintained  and  increased  their  numbers.  Their  excellent 
organisation  of  meetings  in  which  large  amounts  of 
money  were  collected,  he  says,  was  the  basis  of  their 
work.  This  money  was  used  to  help  the  poor,  and 
hence  to  proselytise  them,  and  also  to  pay  the  travelling 
expenses  of  ministers,  many  of  whom  from  England  as 
well  as  the  Colonies  were  always  in  the  field.  George 
Fox's  Orders  and  Canons  were  read  in  those  meetings, 
but  never  the  Bible.2  Books  were  circulated  exciting 
their  youth  to  prejudice  against  the  Church  of  England. 
"  Divers  large  and  fair  structures  for  their  meeting-houses, 
especially  in  Philadelphia,  Burlington  and  Rhode  Island  " 
were  being  built,  and  great  hospitality  was  extended  to 
all  Friends  who  attended  their  meetings.  They  would 
set  up  new  meetings  without  any  resident  ministers,  and 
men  "pretending  to  extraordinary  gifts  of  the  Spirit" 
would  soon  be  exercising  these  gifts.  If  the  ministers 
were  poor,  they  would  be  especially  aided  in  procuring 
lucrative  work  so  that  they  became  rich.  They  dealt 
with  each  other  in  business,  married  each  other,  made 
careful  records  of  births  and  deaths,  and  kept  out  of  the 
militia,  and  other  dangerous  employments,  on  the  plea 
of  conscience.  They  held  the  allegiance  of  their  people 
by  telling  all  the  unfortunate  things  which  happened 

1  Collections  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Historical  Society,  1851. 

a  That  the  Bible  was  read  in  the  meetings  of  Friends  of  early  times  is  certain, 
though  not  regularly.  Samuel  Bownas  says,  ' '  It  came  to  my  mind  to  stand  up 
and  take  out  my  Bible,  which  I  did." 


CH.  in          THE  KEITH  CONTROVERSY  457 

to  their  enemies,  and  the  happy  deaths  of  their  good 
friends. 

The  whole  is  a  portraiture,  made  by  no  friendly  hand, 
of  the  customs  of  Friends  in  those  early  days,  which, 
read  between  the  lines,  shows  a  beautiful  fraternity  and 
an  earnest  missionary  spirit. 

It  shows  also,  perhaps  more  clearly  than  any  other 
document,  the  dawn  of  those  customs  which  soon 
crystallized  into  the  conservatism  of  the  succeeding 
decades.  The  lack  of  educated  leadership  fed  directly 
the  tendencies  to  imitation  of  the  virtues  of  the  past. 
The  fear  of  innovations  and  devotion  to  the  orthodox 
literature  of  the  first  generation  received  a  new  impulse 
from  the  Keith  separation  and  the  partisan  spirit  en 
gendered,  and  the  Society  settled  down  into  a  century 
or  more  of  doctrinal  ease  and  quiet. 

The  influence  of  the  separation  also  probably  brought 
Friends  into  a  more  careful  consideration  of  their  doctrinal 
positions.  The  necessity  to  controvert  the  charge  of 
the  Keithians  that  they  disregarded  the  offices  of  Jesus 
Christ  and  the  authority  of  the  Bible  gave  a  new  life 
to  these  teachings.  Otherwise  they  might  have  easily 
drifted  into  a  position  that  such  outward  helps  to  spiritu 
ality  were  not  important.  They  never  wavered  in  their 
assertion  of  the  efficacy  of  the  Divine  Light  to  lead  into 
all  truth  necessary  to  their  salvation,  but  they  were 
equally  emphatic  in  the  statement  that  the  Scriptures 
were  from  the  same  source  and  constituted  the  test  of 
orthodoxy,  and  were  of  inestimable  value  to  the  Christian. 
The  Keith  controversy  steadied  them  in  this  position. 
Had  he  been  better  balanced  himself,  his  power  would 
have  been  greater.  As  it  was,  for  a  century  after,  their 
committal  to  orthodoxy  kept  Friends  somewhat  in  line 
with  the  other  Christians  of  the  time,  free  from  the 
danger  which  the  exclusive  exaltation  of  the  inner  light 
might  have  developed. 

The  writings  of  George  Keith,  both  before  and  after 
his  repudiation  of  Quakerism,  are  marked  by  an  excellent 
style,  an  earnest  spirit,  much  clearness  in  thought,  and 


458    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.V 

moderation  of  temper.  Perhaps  no  better  presentation 
of  Friendly  tendencies,  even  in  the  works  of  Barclay, 
Penn,  Penington,  or  the  other  voluminous  writers  of  the 
times,  is  to  be  found  than  in  the  books  of  George 
Keith  in  the  years  of  his  Friendly  communion.  They 
contain  not  only  well-considered  defences  of  Christian 
positions,  but  soul-satisfying  appeals  to  live  the  life  most 
in  harmony  with  the  word  of  Christ.  Had  he  died  in 
1690,  they  would  have  ranked  high  as  Quaker  classics. 

Perhaps  also  there  are  few  more  able  presentations 
of  the  positions  held  at  that  time  by  the  Established 
Church  of  England  than  are  in  Keith's  writings  and 
sermons  after  1697.  He  was  intellectually  a  great  man. 
His  changes  from  Presbyterianism  to  Quakerism,  from 
this,  after  nearly  thirty  years'  advocacy,  to  Independency, 
and  from  this  again  to  Episcopalianism,  necessarily  made 
many  enemies  and  required  many  explanations.  His 
biographies  have  been  mainly  written  by  his  opponents 
who  emphasise  his  faults  and  his  apostacy.  He  died  in 
1716,  in  the  performance  of  his  duties  as  minister  of 
the  Established  Church. 

There  is  a  story,  which  seems  to  be  well  authenticated, 
that  he  said  before  he  died  "  that  if  God  had  taken  him 
out  of  the  world  when  he  was  a  Quaker,  it  would  have 
been  well  with  him."  But  the  printer  of  the  will  of 
George  Keith  says  that  he  "never  altered  his  mind  to 
the  last." 


CHAPTER    IV 

GOVERNMENT 

THE  Friends  of  Pennsylvania,  whether  they  wished  it  or 
not,  had  the  responsibilities  of  government  thrown  upon 
them.  The  first  settlers  were  practically  all  Friends,  and 
for  almost  200  years  the  rural  districts  of  the  south 
eastern  corner  of  Pennsylvania  had  almost  exclusively 
Quaker  owners  of  the  soil.  In  a  short  time,  perhaps  in 
three  decades,  the  influx  of  others  made  them  a  minority 
in  the  province.  But  by  the  aid  of  German  voters  and 
their  own  inherent  fitness  for  the  task,  they  retained  an 
easy  supremacy  in  the  Colonial  legislature  till  their 
voluntary  abnegation  in  1756.  It  becomes  an  interesting 
question  to  consider  whence  they  derived  their  principles 
of  government  and  what  those  principles  were. 

On  these  general  principles  there  seemed  great 
harmony.  Their  leader  found  willing  followers.  The 
disputes  among  themselves,  which  at  this  distance  seem 
trivial,  relate  to  matters  of  detail  and  application.  Many 
of  them  doubtless  had  no  settled  theories,  and  followed 
their  Church  leaders  in  State  affairs  with  unthinking 
fidelity.  But  William  Penn  always  found  intelligent  and 
loyal  men  to  carry  out  his  liberal  ideas  or  to  oppose 
them  by  ideas  still  more  liberal. 

The  attitude  of  the  early  Friends  towards  active 
politics  in  England  was  largely  one  of  neutrality.  Being 
dissenters,  and  dissenters  of  an  especially  unpopular  type, 
they  could  not  expect  to  hold  office,  and  there  is  no 
reason  to  assume  that  they  desired  to.  They  were 
rigidly  obedient  to  law  whenever  the  law  did  not  touch 

459 


460    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.V 

their  consciences,  and  with  equal  rigidity  refused  obedience 
whenever  it  did.  They  would  go  to  jail  and  stay  there 
indefinitely  rather  than  remove  their  hats  in  court  or  take 
an  oath,  but  having  been  placed  there  by  lawful  powers, 
no  temptation  in  the  shape  of  open  doors  and  intimations 
from  the  jailers  could  induce  them  to  escape. 

The  times  of  the  Commonwealth  and  the  later  Stuarts 
were  times  of  vast  numbers  of  plots  and  counter-plots,  but 
against  all  of  these  the  Friends  were  ever  ready  to  testify. 
They  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  them  on  one  side  or 
the  other.  It  became  in  time  a  favourite  doctrine  that 
thiey  had  no  responsibility  for  the  creation  of  any 
government,  and  that  their  only  duty  was  to  be  entirely 
obedient  to  the  one  that  then  existed. 

They  were  never  revolutionists,  but  they  transferred 
their  allegiance  without  demur  from  Cromwell  to  Charles 
and  from  James  to  William  and  Mary  as  soon  as  the 
successful  revolution  was  accomplished. 

While  the  responsibilities  placed  upon  them  in  America 
caused  in  various  ways  a  change  of  attitude  towards 
government,  when  the  American  Revolution  broke  out 
this  old  testimony  against  plotting  was  made  to  do  duty 
in  the  attitude  of  neutrality  which  all  of  their  Meetings 
adopted.  Some  of  the  wise  Friends  protested  against 
this  position,  while  definitely  opposing  war.  They  urged 
such  encouragement  to  the  American  cause  as  Friends 
could  conscientiously  give.  Thus  Dr.  Fothergill  writes : 

"If  America  relaxes,  both  you  and  we  are  all  undone. 
Submission  to  the  prevailing  power  must  be  your  duty.  The 
prevailing  power  is  the  general  voice  of  America." 

This  very  mild  advice  was  considered  too  strong  by 
many  of  the  Friends,  and  the  impression  was  given  that 
they  were  actively  hostile  to  the  American  cause.  We 
shall  have  occasion  to  say  more  on  this  subject  in  the 
future.  Suffice  it  at  present  to  note  that  the  American 
Friends  had  received  from  their  English  ancestors  such 
a  strong  bias  in  opposition  to  any  change  of  government, 
such  a  firm  belief  in  the  necessity  of  obedience  to  every 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  461 

existing  law  which  did  not  encroach  upon  their  consciences, 
that  tradition  made  many  of  them  faithful  to  British 
allegiance  who  would  otherwise  have  warmly  welcomed 
American  independence.  "The  setting  up  and  putting 
down  of  governments  is  God's  peculiar  prerogative," 
declared  their  Yearly  Meeting. 

The  testimony  against  war  is  perfectly  intelligible,  but 
the  testimony  against  all  revolution  by  any  means  except 
passive  resistance  is  much  less  so,  and  probably  would  not 
now  be  considered  an  essential  part  of  Quaker  polity. 
But  if,  under  ordinary  circumstances,  the  Friends  were 
thus  passively  obedient  to  existing  powers  (relying  upon 
the  frequently  expressed  advice  of  George  Fox  and  his 
friends  to  keep  clear  of  all  worldly  commotions),  they 
were  profoundly  disobedient  to  other  demands  of  the 
Government.  Obedience  to  conscience,  or  what  they 
assumed  to  be  the  Divine  command  to  them  as 
individuals,  in  every  smallest  item  was  always  to  be 
superior  to  any  obligation  of  obedience  to  a  human 
power.  They  lived  up  to  this  principle  with  unfaltering 
courage.  One  can  see  now  that  the  wearing  of  the  hat 
and  the  use  of  the  singular  pronoun  were  testimonies  to 
human  equality  which  it  is  fortunate  that  some  one  has 
borne.  But  this  argument  was  used  by  the  Friends  but 
seldom.  Their  main  reliance  was  a  consciousness  of 
rectitude  which  was  not  always  voiced  in  arguments,  and 
while  some  of  them  entered  hotly  into  the  theological 
controversies  of  the  times,  and  made  many  laboured 
defences  of  their  positions,  many  of  the  reasons  which 
seemed  to  them  good  and  effective  would  appeal  very 
slightly  or  not  at  all  to  their  successors. 

The  great  principles  which  had  been  established  by 
their  faithfulness  are  usually  admitted  to  be  the  basis  of 
civil  and  religious  liberty  in  England,  but  they  did  not 
feel  much  responsibility  for  the  conduct  of  the  govern 
ment.  Their  responsibility  was  to  themselves  as  subjects 
of  the  government 

With  the  exception  of  William  Penn,  who  publicly 
advocated  the  election  of  the  republican  Algernon  Sydney 


462   QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.V 

to  Parliament,  and  in  other  ways  made  himself  active 
in  public  affairs,  there  was  very  little  participation  in 
politics,  and  even  Penn,  with  the  responsibilities  of  Penn 
sylvania  resting  upon  him,  could  write  to  his  children  in 
1699: 

"  Meddle  not  with  government ;  never  speak  of  it,  let  others 
say  or  do  as  they  please ;  .  .  .  I  have  said  little  to  you  about 
distributing  justice,  or  being  just  in  power  or  government,  for 
I  should  desire  you  should  never  be  concerned  therein." 

If,  therefore,  we  are  to  judge  of  the  public  attitude  of 
Friends  by  reference  to  early  days  in  England,  we  have 
little  on  which  to  base  an  opinion  which  will  be  of  much 
service  to  us  in  later  times.  When  they  came  to  America, 
conditions  were  different.  Wherever  a  group  of  Friends  got 
together,  political  instincts  came  to  the  surface.  In  Rhode 
Island,  for  several  years,  they  had  the  important  offices  in 
their  hands  and  were  the  active  political  workers  of  the 
colony.  The  same  was  true  in  North  Carolina  for  a  little 
time  under  John  Archdale.  In  New  Jersey,  while  there 
was  an  effort  to  deprive  them  of  public  influence,  it  was 
found  that  the  government  could  not  be  conducted  with 
out  them.  In  Pennsylvania,  they  took  up  the  problem 
with  their  eyes  open  and  a  full  comprehension  of  the 
responsibilities  involved.  In  this  Colony  we  can  best 
study  the  application  of  Quakerism  to  politics  and  the 
problems  of  the  State.  The  issues  were  partly  determined 
by  the  general  principles  of  the  Society  of  Friends,  and 
partly  by  the  broad-minded  and  forceful  personality  of 
William  Penn. 

The  passivity  with  which  Friends  suffered  in  certain 
circumstances  when  their  convictions  were  attacked 
hardly  seems  to  have  been  their  attitude  when  in  active 
politics.  Abuses  were  checked  with  a  strong  hand. 
Morality  of  a  high  order  was  demanded  and  secured. 
Standards  were  maintained  and  wrong-doing  vigorously 
and  effectively  punished.  Sometimes  we  find  evidence 
that  their  faith  that  an  Almighty  Power  would  rectify 
abuses  gave  them  confidence  in  ultimate  triumph,  even 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  463 

under  dark  conditions,  but  it  did  not  seem  to  cause  them 
to  abate  their  own  efforts. 

Acquiescence  in  evil  when  the  means  were  at  hand  to 
strike  it  down  morally  never  was  a  part  of  their  principles 
or  practice.  It  has  been  left  for  mercenary  and  time 
serving  men  of  later  ages  to  preach  a  timid  and  nerveless 
policy  and  then  to  shelter  themselves  behind  a  supposed 
Quaker  example  of  non-resistance.  Quakers  were  not 
non-resistants.  ,They  resisted  most  courageously,  and  at 
their  best  most  successfully,  many  forms  of  political  ills. 
Their  resistance  only  ceased  when  they  were  asked  to  use 
immoral  means.  Here  they  drew  the  line,  and  a  careful 
student  of  Quaker  political  ethics  will  find  them  advo 
cating  not  supine  submission  to  wrong,  but  a  resistance 
limited  in  its  methods  by  the  moral  law  alone.  To  do  evil 
to  correct  evil  was  never  a  part  of  their  theory  of  govern 
ment  or  public  action,  and  this  hesitation  sometimes  has 
made  them  seem  less  vigorous  than  others. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  same  conscientiousness  has 
kept  them  true  to  resistance  under  circumstances  when 
hope  seemed  to  have  disappeared,  and  other  advocates  of 
the  good  fight  have  given  it  up,  or  postponed  it  to  a  more 
propitious  period. 

The  influence  of  Friendly  ideas  upon  American 
institutions,  and  especially  the  experiment  of  William 
Penn,  has  been  great.  It  is  quite  possible  that  these 
institutions  have  drawn  more  from  the  principles  brought 
over  in  the  Welcome  than  from  the  intellectual  freightage 
of  any  other  ship ;  that  of  all  the  colonial  founders 
William  Penn  saw  more  truly  than  any  other  the  line 
on  which  the  future  would  develop ;  that  himself  and  his 
collaborators  builded  more  wisely  than  any  others  when  they 
reared  a  state  devoted  to  democracy,  liberty  and  peace. 

It  was  with  them  no  denominational  question.  "  I 
would  found  a  free  colony  for  all  mankind  that  shall  come 
hither,"  Penn  declared,  and  while  the  early  settlers,  both 
British  and  German,  were  men  of  kindred  spirit  and 
impulses,  the  very  basis  of  their  union,  peace  and  justice 
with  all  and  equal  rights  without  regard  to  religious 


464    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

affiliation,  inevitably  drew  vast  numbers  of  all  sorts.  So 
that  the  Quaker  majority  soon  disappeared,  and  before 
the  Revolution  the  province  might  more  truthfully  be 
said  to  have  been  German  or  Scotch- Irish  Presbyterian 
in  its  prevailing  tendencies  than  Quaker. 

Yet  through  it  all,  the  basis  laid  down  by  Penn  stood, 
and  when  in  1780  to  1790  this  band  of  scattered  states  was 
gathering  itself  into  a  nation,  and  painfully  picking  up 
the  threads  of  principle,  political  and  social,  with  which 
it  would  weave  its  permanent  fabric,  it  found  them  not 
in  the  dogmatism  of  Massachusetts,  or  the  aristocracy 
of  Virginia,  but  in  the  civil  and  religious  liberty  of 
Pennsylvania. 

When  later  the  nation  recovered  from  its  debauch  of 
Indian  atrocities  and  encroachment  upon  weaker  nations, 
it  saw  the  way  in  the  success  of  the  policy  of  justice 
practised  for  three  score  years  in  the  eastern  end  of 
this  province,  making  it  a  little  oasis  in  the  dreary 
history  of  blood  and  aggression  which  told  the  story  in 
New  England,  New  York  and  the  South,  and  accompanied 
the  frontiers  as  they  were  pushed  forward  to  the 
Mississippi  and  beyond. 

If  the  signs  of  the  times  as  represented  by  the  Hague 
Congresses  and  the  universal  demand  for  peaceful 
methods  of  arbitration  coming  up  from  the  Boards  of 
Trade  and  the  Labour  organisations  of  all  countries  mean 
anything,  they  indicate  that  the  Friendly  settlers  had  a 
glimpse  of  a  principle  in  which  they  had  sufficient  faith  to 
abide,  for  a  long  time  deemed  Utopian,  but  now  within 
sight  of  adoption. 

All  these  were  worked  out  in  England  by  Penn  and 
his  many  unknown  advisers,  and  were  brought  to  shore 
at  Chester  when  he  called  together  his  first  legislative 
body  in  the  early  winter  of  1682. 

He  could  not  extinguish  denominational  rancour. 
Men  looked  on  religious  doctrine  and  belief  more  seriously 
than  now.  It  was  critical  and  all  compelling.  Govern 
ment  was  a  brand  of  religion,  the  Bible  was  the  standard, 
and  each  man's  interpretation  of  the  Bible  was  sacred. 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  465 

So  said  the  zealous  religionists  of  the  day.  So  said  some 
of  the  Friends  themselves.  Did  we  not  come  over  here 
to  create  a  Quaker  preserve  whence  all  error  should  be 
excluded  and  a  truly  righteous  Commonwealth  established? 
Why  should  we  on  equal  terms  admit  all  others  to 
citizenship  with  ourselves  who  have  won  a  little  corner  of 
the  wilderness  where  we  can  work  out  our  destiny  in  our 
own  way  ? 

The  argument  was  plausible,  and  other  colonies  had 
not  been  able  to  resist  it.  But  Penn  said,  "  We  should 
look  selfish,  and  do  that  which  we  have  cried  out  against 
others  for,  namely,  letting  nobody  touch  government,  but 
those  of  their  own  way,"  and  the  narrow  sectarianism 
disappeared. 

But  while  the  doctrine  of  equal  rights  in  government 
could  not  be  shaken,  when  it  came  to  methods  men 
would  divide  on  denominational  lines.  Quakers  and 
Presbyterians,  in  the  later  colonial  days,  were  names  not 
only  of  religious  affiliation  but  of  political  policy.  "  To 
govern  is  absolutely  repugnant  to  the  avowed  principles 
of  Quakerism "  declared  the  Presbyterians  in  the  hot 
pamphlet  warfare  of  1764  which  followed  the  invasion  of 
the  "  Paxton  boys."  "  To  be  governed,"  was  the  reply, 
perhaps  about  equally  truthful,  "  is  absolutely  repugnant 
to  the  avowed  principles  of  Presbyterianism." 

A  little  earlier  than  this,  the  Episcopal  minister  of 
Chester  wrote  to  his  English  brethren  : 

"The  flock  committed  to  my  charge  is  indeed  small;  but 
God  be  thanked,  generally  sound,  which  is  as  much  as  can  be 
expected  considering  the  religion  of  the  bulk  of  the  people 
among  whom  they  live.  I  need  not  tell  you  that  Quakerism  is 
generally  preferred  in  Pennsylvania,  and  in  no  county  of  the 
province  does  the  haughty  tribe  appear  more  rampant  than 
where  I  reside,  there  being  by  a  modest  comparison  twenty 
Quakers,  besides  dissenters,  to  one  true  churchman." 

But  these  harmless  polemics  were  but  the  counterparts 
to  actual  persecution  and  disabilities  elsewhere.  In  New 
England,  as  Longfellow  makes  the  Puritan  minister  to 
say,  "  There  is  no  room  in  Christ's  triumphant  army  for 

2  H 


466    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

tolerationists."  So  they  drove  out  the  Baptists  and 
Episcopalians  and  hanged  the  persistent  Quakers  on 
Boston  Common.  In  New  York  after  Dutch  times,  in 
Maryland  when  the  Catholics  lost  control,  and  in  all  the 
South,  the  Established  Church  held  the  offices,  the  jury- 
box,  and  the  franchise,  and  the  actual  liberty  and  property 
of  dissenters  were  hardly  maintained. 

In  the  State  of  Rhode  Island  alone  was  there  equality 
of  political  right  and  freedom  of  conscience.  The 
experiment  among  the  little  handful  of  people  there  was 
not  conclusive,  and  it  required  no  little  faith  and  courage 
for  Penn  to  embark  his  whole  fortune,  his  reputation  just 
budding  under  the  favouring  friendship  of  the  Stuart 
kings  and  paternal  influences,  the  standing  and  prosperity 
of  his  religious  society,  dearer  than  fortune  or  reputation, 
in  an  enterprise  so  largely  based  on  an  untried  and 
seemingly  impossible  principle. 

The  problems  of  the  relation  of  Church  to  State  are 
not  yet  all  worked  out.  How  to  give  the  children  of  the 
country  the  religious  education  they  should  have  without 
violating  the  conscience  of  any ;  how  to  secure  the 
Biblical  knowledge  in  our  country  necessary  to  appreciate 
our  standard  literature  and  maintain  our  institutions, 
permeated,  often  insensibly,  by  Christian  ideas  and 
standards  ;  how,  in  short,  to  prevent  a  break  with  the 
past  which  will  destroy  the  fruits  of  our  old  endeavours 
and  the  continuity  of  history, — this  is  still  our  problem. 

But  no  sane  man  thinks  it  lies  in  a  State  religion  or 
sectarian  test.  When  Penn  sailed  up  the  Delaware,  the 
beginning  of  the  end  of  ecclesiasticism  in  politics  began, 
and  when  he  pledged  himself  and  his  heirs  to  maintain 
"inviolably  forever"  the  foremost  clause  of  his  charter 
granting  religious  liberty  to  all,  it  was  the  legislative 
enactment  which,  a  century  later,  had  ceased  to  be  an 
experiment,  and  was  imperishably  chiselled  into  the 
national  constitution. 

Liberty  always  means  conservatism.  It  is  the  abso 
lute  monarchy  which  has  to  fear  revolution.  The  free 
government  moves  quietly  forward  to  the  accomplishment 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  467 

of  its  ends,  for  progress  is  the  normal  condition  of 
humanity,  and  the  strain  to  prevent  it,  to  keep  things 
fixed,  is  the  danger  of  every  stationary  system.  The 
free  government  feels  the  gusts  of  public  opinion,  bends 
before  them,  and  rises  superior  to  them,  holding  fast  to 
the  good  that  is  nearly  always  in  them,  but  quietly 
detecting  and  refusing  the  evanescent  or  injurious. 

One  finds  in  the  early  government  of  Pennsylvania 
a  certain  sanity  which  was  the  logical  concomitant  of 
liberty.  Her  paper  money  before  the  Revolution  never 
depreciated,  and  this,  I  believe,  could  be  said  of  no 
other  Colony.  She  had  no  witchcraft  crazes.  The  one 
trial  held  before  William  Penn  himself  in  1683,  in 
Chester,  when  the  usual  charges  of  injuring  children  and 
bewitching  cattle  were  brought  against  an  unfortunate 
woman,  simply  resulted  in  a  verdict  of  guilty  of  the 
common  fame  of  being  a  witch,  but  not  guilty  as 
indicted.  Her  friends  took  charge  of  her,  and  no  new 
cases  developed.  It  was  in  the  next  decade  that 
witches  were  being  slaughtered  with  horrid  cruelties  in 
Massachusetts. 

Free  institutions  brought  free  thought,  and  free  thought 
is  the  only  atmosphere  in  which  science  can  flourish.  It 
is  no  accident  that  about  Revolutionary  times  a  company 
of  scientists,  unrivalled  elsewhere  in  America,  and  perhaps 
in  Europe,  sprang  up  in  Philadelphia.  The  botanists 
Bartram  and  Marshall,  the  astronomer  Rittenhouse,  the 
ornithologists  Audubon  and  Wilson,  a  host  of  dis 
tinguished  physicians,  and  above  all,  the  versatile  Franklin, 
found  a  congenial  home  in  the  uncramped  atmosphere  of 
a  liberal  democracy. 

Freedom  and  peace  brought  also  unequalled  material 
prosperity.  The  natives  of  the  ravaged  Rhine  Valley, 
the  battle-ground  of  Europe,  the  hardly  used  tenants  of 
Ulster  whose  Presbyterianism  was  attacked,  heard  of  a 
land  where  war  was  unknown  and  religion  was  secure, 
and  came  in  unprecedented  numbers. 

Though  the  last  to  be  founded,  Pennsylvania  grew  the 
most  rapidly,  and  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution  shared  with 


468    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES    BK.  v 

Massachusetts  and  Virginia  the  leading  place  in  prosperity 
and  wealth.  Its  chief  city  was  the  largest,  best  governed, 
and  most  progressive  in  the  colonies.  This,  Andrew 
Hamilton,  the  great  lawyer  of  the  province,  said  in  1737, 
they  owed  not  primarily  to  their  fertile  lands,  or  great 
rivers  extending  into  the  country,  or  any  other  material 
thing,  but  to  "  the  constitution  of  Mr.  Penn." 

The  great  hope  and  lesson  is  this  (and  Penn  foresaw 
it,  perhaps  dimly) :  give  the  people  freedom  and  education, 
and  tendencies  dangerous  to  political  or  social  or  material 
conditions  may  have  their  little  day,  but  do  not  last. 
Russia  has  the  same  physical  advantages  as  the  United 
States,  but  she  has  no  freedom,  no  room  to  develop,  and 
hence  is  sunk  in  poverty,  immorality,  and  intellectual 
stagnation,  without  security  for  the  future. 

The  other  principle  which  Penn  tried  to  engraft  on 
his  experimental  commonwealth  was  peace.  We  now  see 
that  there  were  at  that  time  unsurmountable  difficulties 
in  the  way  of  a  permanent  adoption  of  peace  by  any  one 
nation,  and  yet  perhaps  it  did  not  seem  to  Penn  more 
impossible  than  liberty.  A  necessary  element  to  success 
must  inevitably  be  justice.  It  could  not  be  expected 
that  natives  or  neighbours  would  be  peaceful  if  aggression 
were  made  on  their  rights,  real  or  supposed.  So  Penn 
did  more  than  buy  the  Indian  lands.  He  bought  them 
of  all  claimants.  He  paid  what  was  in  their  minds  a 
liberal  price.  He  did  not  cheat  them  with  false  maps  or 
deceptive  compass  bearings,  or  weights  and  measures 
that  lied.  He  kept,  as  much  as  he  could,  fire-water  from 
them.  When  they  got  home,  and  thought  the  matter 
over,  they  had  only  friendly  feelings,  and  till  new  forces 
came  into  power,  and  new  methods  were  used,  there  were 
no  wars. 

He  meant  also  to  deal  justly  with  foreign  powers  ;  but 
England  would  fight  and  her  colonies  had  no  control,  and 
demands  for  troops  against  Canada  made  endless  trouble, 
and  the  policy  ultimately  broke  down  through  the  opera 
tion  of  forces  outside  the  reach  of  the  province.  All  that 
the  Colony  could  do  was  to  adopt  the  advice  of  Paul : 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  469 

"  If  it  be  possible,  as  much  as  lieth  in  you,  live  peaceably 
with  all  men,"  which  is  no  slight  guarantee  of  peace. 
Few  men  will  attack  an  inoffensive  man,  and  few  nations 
will  attack  a  nation  which  is  known  never  to  do  an  unjust 
deed  or  give  any  cause  of  offence. 

The  argument  of  Penn  and  his  friends  was  something 
like  this  : 

We  will  act  justly,  even  generously,  with  all,  red  men  and 
white  men  alike.  We  will  never  be  an  aggressor.  If  attacked, 
therefore,  we  will  always  be  in  the  right.  We  will  not  yield  one 
iota  of  our  rights  willingly,  but  will  defend  them  by  all  means 
which  in  themselves  are  right.  We  can  not  fight,  for  we  believe 
that  fighting  itself  is  immoral,  and  we  will  not  do  wrong  even 
for  a  righteous  cause.  If  there  is  no  other  alternative,  we  can 
suffer  as  we  have  shown  our  capacity  to  suffer  in  England,  and 
conquer  by  suffering. 

It  was,  as  will  be  seen,  a  doubtful  experiment  whose 
success  was  dependent  on  conditions  not  likely  to  arise, 
and  yet  it  pointed  the  way  to  the  future.  It  gave  the 
most  potential  lesson  in  the  world's  history  of  the 
possibilities  of  applied  Christianity  as  shown  in  a  policy 
of  justice  and  moral  resistance. 

The  argument  was  that  the  moral  law  was  transcendent 
to  all  decrees  of  king  and  legislatures,  and  to  all  supposed 
exigencies  of  circumstances.  No  conditions  permitted  its 
annulment.  No  necessities  were  so  great  as  to  justify  its 
abrogation.  It  was  the  all-wise  Creator's  law  upon  which 
all  right  human  conduct  must  be  based.  It  could  not 
always  be  accurately  determined,  but  when  known,  it  was 
imperative,  and  so  to  fight  evil  with  evil  was,  in  the  long 
run,  only  to  postpone  the  victory  of  truth  and  to  pile  up 
trouble  for  the  future.  Fight,  fight  continuously  and 
without  flinching,  but  do  not  play  into  the  hands  of 
iniquity  by  substituting  one  form  for  another — this  was 
the  influence  and  example  of  William  Penn.  This  is 
far  from  non-resistance.  The  teaching  of  Penn  was  not 
the  teaching  of  Tolstoy.  Resist  all  you  can  with'  vigour 
and  practical  efficacy  but  do  it  morally,  said  one.  Do 
not  do  anything,  says  the  other,  except  your  own  quiet 


470    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

work  ;  the  truth  will  triumph  of  itself  if  you  do  not 
obstruct.  There  was  a  vast  gap  between  the  two 
positions. 

Liberty  and  peace  :  these  were  the  two  main  elements 
of  the  Holy  Experiment.  There  was  not  room  in 
Europe,  for  system  there  was  set,  and  prejudice  would  not 
yield.  But  with  all  the  enthusiasm  of  his  nature,  Penn 
saw  the  ideal  commonwealth  growing  up  in  his  woods. 
He  was  to  have  bitter  disappointments ;  his  colonies 
were  to  be  ungrateful,  unappreciative  of  their  great 
opportunities,  haggling  over  little  matters  of  property,  led 
by  demagogues  into  unreasonable  demands ;  he  himself 
was  to  lose  his  splendid  patrimony  in  the  enterprise  and  go 
to  a  debtor's  jail ;  disease  was  to  wreck  his  great  intellect ; 
the  wife  of  his  youth,  to  whom  he  was  romantically 
attached,  was  to  be  taken  from  him  ;  his  children  were  to 
be  bitter  disappointments  ;  but  he  could  not  foresee  these 
blows  of  fortune,  and  none  can  blame  him  if,  on  the  bright 
October  day  as  he  landed  at  Chester,  he  felt  all  the 
exultation  of  his  seemingly  unlimited  opportunities. 

Proprietor  and  legislator  by  the  Charter  of  the  Crown, 
he  would  use  his  great  powers,  not  for  aggrandisement  or 
personal  glory,  or  a  hereditary  pre-eminence,  but,  he  says, 
"  I  will  put  the  power  in  the  people,"  and  he  saw,  perhaps, 
with  his  far-seeing  vision,  a  commonwealth  where  idealism 
should  become  a  reality.  His  enthusiasm  did  not  see  the 
slow  growth  and  the  many  set-backs. 

The  material  prosperity  has  been,  doubtless,  beyond  his 
wildest  dreams.  To  him,  this  would  have  been  valuable 
only  as  making  happy  homes  and  beneficent  institutions. 
The  material  never  would  have  dominated  the  spiritual. 
Righteousness,  piety,  beneficence  :  these  were  the  fruits  for 
which  the  growth  of  riches  was  worth  while,  and  without 
which  liberty  itself  would  be  no  blessing.  It  is  still  true, 
as  the  old  Grecian  declared,  that  "  virtue  does  not  come 
from  wealth,  but  wealth  and  every  other  good  thing  we 
have  comes  from  virtue." 

"  William  Penn  is  offered  great  things,"  writes  James  Claypoole, 
";£6ooo  for  a  monopoly  in  trade,  which  he  refused.  I  truly 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  471 

believe   he   does   aim  more   at   justice   and  righteousness  and 
spreading  of  truth  than  at  his  own  particular  gain." 

These  were  the  words  of  one  who  wanted  to  form  a 
trust  to  secure  the  Indian  trade,  but  was  surprised  to  learn 
that  the  founder  cared  somewhat,  though  then  in  great 
need  of  money,  for  the  kind  of  men  who  would  be  let 
loose  upon  the  frontier  to  annul  his  policy  of  fairness  to 
the  Red -men.  "  I  did  refuse  a  great  temptation  last 
Second-day,"  Penn  quietly  remarked,  "but  I  would  not 
defile  what  came  to  me  clean." 

Plato  wrote  his  Republic,  Thomas  More  his  Utopia, 
and  John  Locke  his  Fundamental  Constitution,  building 
up  in  theory  ideal  commonwealths.  The  last  one  was 
tried  in  practice  and  proved  a  failure.  William  Penn  had 
the  opportunity  and  the  wisdom,  a  combination  which 
comes  to  scarcely  one  man  in  a  millennium,  to  rear  in  his 
study  a  theory  of  government  on  the  broadest  principles 
of  right  and  justice,  and  to  set  it  to  work  in  a  vast  territory 
with  friendly  neighbours  and  a  sympathetic  population. 
These  principles,  by  their  inherent  vitality,  went  far 
beyond  the  bounds  of  his  commonwealth,  and  a  great 
nation  found  in  them  the  best  expression  of  its  aspirations 
and  needs,  and  is  living  on  them  to-day. 

In  the  matter  of  oaths,  the  Friends  had  another  difficult 
experiment.  They  were  firmly  convinced  of  their  pro 
hibition  in  the  New  Testament  and  of  their  general 
inutility.  Hence,  for  themselves,  they  could  do  nothing 
but  refuse  to  take  or  administer  them.  But  the  laws  of 
England  demanded  them.  At  first,  in  Pennsylvania, 
they  attempted  to  get  along  without  them.  But  certain 
Crown  officers,  not  responsible  to  the  Colonial  Govern 
ment,  and  not  Friends,  were  required  by  English  law  to  be 
sworn  and  to  swear  others,  and  concessions  to  such  had 
to  be  made.  There  was  much  trouble  for  a  number  of 
years,  both  as  to  the  oath  and  the  form  of  affirmation, 
which  contained  the  words  "  in  the  presence  of  Almighty 
God."  This  was  assumed  to  be  something  of  the  nature 
of  an  oath,  also  to  occasion  the  irreverent  use  of  a  sacred 
name. 


472    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

In  1718  a  settlement  of  the  matter  was  attempted, 
making  an  affirmation  valid  in  evidence  and  as  a  qualifica 
tion  for  office,  and  affixing  the  same  penalties  for  lying 
and  perjury,  which  Act  was  confirmed  by  the  English 
Crown.  A  few  years  later,  the  name  of  God  was  stricken 
from  the  form  of  affirmation.  Friends  could  now  be  freed 
from  any  disqualifications,  except  that  they  could  not  hold 
offices,  the  duties  of  which  included  administering  oaths, 
and  the  Meetings  insisted  on  their  resigning  such  positions. 
They  were  not  troubled,  however,  as  witnesses  or  jurymen, 
or  as  members  of  the  legislature,  or  as  other  officials, 
except  as  above  mentioned,  and  matters  still  stand 
practically  as  arranged  in  1725. 

The  threat  of  an  imposition  of  an  oath  in  order  to 
drive  Friends  from  power  was  frequently  made  both  in 
Pennsylvania  and  England  by  those  politically  hostile. 
In  1756  it  is  probable  that  this  threat  would  have  been 
made  good  by  Parliament,  had  not  Friends  resigned  from 
the  Assembly. 

The  "Great  Law"  of  1682,  which  William  Penn 
brought  with  him  from  England,  made  capital  punishment 
applicable  to  the  crimes  of  murder  and  treason  only.  So 
far  as  is  known  there  was  only  one  case  of  capital  punish 
ment  before  1700,  and  that  was  for  murder.  It  was 
charged  by  the  opposition  that  this  leniency  encouraged 
crime  and,  along  with  the  absence  of  oaths,  it  was  an 
indictment  of  the  efficiency  of  the  colonial  government. 
There  does  not  seem  to  be  much  truth  in  the  charge,  but 
the  Friends  were  willing  to  compromise  in  the  matter. 
The  Act  of  1718,  which  made  affirmations  valid,  contained 
additional  clauses  accepting  the  laws  of  England  in  their 
provisions  for  the  penalties  for  crime,  and  some  dozen  of 
offences  were  added  to  the  capital  list.  This  Act  was 
drawn  up  by  a  Quaker  lawyer,  and  passed  by  a  Quaker 
Assembly,  without  protest  from  the  Meetings.  There 
appears  to  have  been  no  testimony  against  capital  punish 
ment  per  se.  The  law  stood  all  through  the  colonial 
days,  but  when,  in  the  Revolution,  the  Quaker  control 
was  finally  ended,  the  opposing  party  readopted  the  laws 


CH.  iv  GOVERNMENT  473 

of  the  early  times.  Penn  and  his  mild  penal  code  died 
in  the  same  year,  and  its  restoration  came  about  when 
his  denominational  successors  were  driven  from  power. 

The  Act  of  1718  was  apparently  a  political  bargain 
which  extended  capital  punishment  in  exchange  for  a 
relief  from  oath-taking.  It  has  been  said  that  Penn's 
"  Holy  Experiment "  ended  with  his  death.  This  is  true 
in  the  one  feature  of  penalties  for  crime,  but  hardly 
otherwise.  The  absence  of  any  positive  testimony  against 
taking  human  life  weakened  the  position  of  the  Friends 
on  the  subject  of  war,  though  they  were  able  to  point  to 
a  valid  distinction  between  police  and  martial  measures. 
Had  they  abolished  capital  punishment,  or  even  kept  it 
down  to  the  limitations  of  the  founder,  so  far  in  advance 
of  anything  else  ever  tried,  charges  of  inconsistency,  which 
troubled  them  considerably  in  their  political  arguments, 
and  threw  certain  forces  to  the  side  of  their  opponents, 
would  have  been  avoided.  But  they  had  not  reached 
this  position. 

The  political  principles  of  Friends  seem  to  have  been 
a  logical  deduction  from  their  theology.  The  doctrines  of 
direct  Divine  messages  given  to  men,  created  a  spiritual 
democracy.  It  was  this  message,  rather  than  any  other 
merits  of  the  messenger,  which  was  to  be  honoured.  It 
came  to  the  poor  and  ignorant  as  well  as  to  the  wealthy 
and  learned.  The  humblest  member  of  a  great  congrega 
tion  might  break  forth  in  heavenly  accents  of  praise  or 
exhortation.  No  human  ordination  and  no  scholastic 
requirements  were  necessarily  precedent.  All  was  equality. 
Closely  connected  with  this  root  doctrine  were  the  refusal 
to  remove  the  hat  (then  a  mark  of  inferiority),  the  con 
sistent  use  of  the  singular  pronoun,  and  the  plain  spoken- 
ness  and  persistency  with  which  sin  was  rebuked  and 
illegal  authority  disowned. 

Religious  liberty,  which  is  much  more  than  toleration, 
and  civil  equality  could  not  fail  to  be  essential  parts  of  a 
system  of  government  conducted  by  such  men.  Freedom 
of  conscience  would  be  its  very  choicest  possession.  They 
would  get  into  the  spirit,  which,  as  George  Fox  said, 


474    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  v 

"  took  away  the  occasion  of  all  wars,"  and  love  and  peace 
would  characterise  their  intercourse  among  each  other  and 
to  all  men.  However  far  from  this  standard  were  the 
lives  of  many  of  them  after  persecution  ceased,  there  were 
always  some  who  were  up  to  it ;  and  the  extreme  veneration 
felt  for  the  holy  men  of  the  first  generation,  kept  the  others 
in  outward  conformity.  They  buttressed  their  position 
by  Biblical  arguments,  and  always  were  willing  in  their 
discussions,  to  abide  by  the  verdict  of  the  book.  But 
among  themselves,  their  own  experience  of  truth  and 
godliness  was  its  own  convincing  evidence. 


CHAPTER    V 

THE   FRIENDS   AS    POLITICIANS 

UNLIKE  other  colonies,  Pennsylvania  came  under  the 
political  control  of  Friends  at  the  first.  When  Penn 
landed  at  what  is  now  Chester  on  the  Delaware  River  in 
the  fall  of  1682,  he  called  together  a  Legislative  Assembly. 
This  consisted  of  representatives  of  the  Swedes  and  Dutch 
who  had  previously  settled  there,  and  of  the  newly  arrived 
English  Friends.  The  lines  were  immediately  drawn  on 
the  election  of  the  Speaker.  At  a  time  when  two  of  the 
old  residents  were  absent,  the  Friends  carried  the  day  by 
a  majority  of  one.  This  was  the  nearest  to  losing  control 
of  the  popular  Assembly  which  they  experienced  for  seventy- 
four  years.  Often  every  member  was  a  Friend.  Always 
they  constituted  a  large  and  controlling  majority. 

This  division  in  the  first  Legislative  Assembly  seemed 
to  create  no  permanent  feeling,  and  it  proceeded  to  ratify 
the  laws  which  Penn  had  drawn  up  in  England,  with  some 
modifications  satisfactory  to  him,  with  great  unanimity. 

These  first  colonists  were  mostly  men  who  had  lost 
much  property,  and  had  felt  the  rigours  of  English  and 
Welsh  jails  for  months  and  years.  They  were  not  likely  to 
make  trouble  in  government.  They  were  profoundly  thank 
ful  for  their  escape  from  persecution,  for  their  beautiful 
country,  and  for  the  liberties  which  their  founder  granted 
them.  He  was  among  them  in  the  vigour  and  enthusiasm 
of  mature  manhood,  meeting  every  reasonable  demand, 
adjusting  difficulties  in  a  statesmanlike  and  liberal  spirit, 
and  enjoying  with  them  the  reality  of  their  Divine 
Communion  in  the  religious  meetings.  Everything  was 

475 


476    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

sweet  and  harmonious,  and  the  government  started  under 
the  best  of  conditions. 

"Two  general  assemblies,"  Penn  writes  in  August  1683,  "have 
been  held,  and  with  such  concord  and  dispatch  that  they  sat  but 
three  weeks,  and  at  least  seventy  laws  were  passed  without  one 
dissent  in  any  material  thing." 

This  first  specimen  of  Quaker  legislation  embraced 
provisions  for  the  absence  of  any  religious  test,  except 
belief  in  a  God,  for  extended  suffrage,  for  freedom  of 
conscience,  for  legal  protection  of  individual  rights,  for 
the  mildest  penal  code  ever  enacted  up  to  that  time,  for 
forbidding  the  sale  of  liquor  to  the  Indians,  for  abolishing 
primogenitures,  against  swearing,  duelling,  cock-fighting, 
stage-plays,  lotteries,  and  drunkenness.  The  Friends  were 
puritan  in  the  matter  of  popular  amusements,  not  so  rigid 
as  the  New  Englanders,  but  still  with  the  idea  that  it 
was  necessary  to  maintain  a  moral  and  godly  common 
wealth. 

The  Charter  which  Penn  gave  his  colonies  was  modified 
several  times  in  the  first  score  of  years.  In  1701,  when 
he  sailed  for  England,  he  included  in  the  final  form  the 
features  which  experience  had  suggested.  It  became  in 
time  a  revered  instrument,  lasting  till  the  revolutionary 
spirit  of  1776  overthrew  it  in  common  with  every  other 
vestige  of  subordination  to  England.  But  even  then  it 
disappeared  with  the  sincere  regret  of  many  friends  of 
independence. 

The  first  article  grants  liberty  of  conscience  to  all,  but 
restricts  the  right  to  hold  office  to  those  who  profess  to 
believe  in  Jesus  Christ.  The  second  requires  an  assembly 
of  one  house  to  be  chosen  annually,  which  has  power  to 
judge  of  the  qualifications  of  its  members,  to  make  all 
laws,  subject  to  the  Governor's  veto,  to  vote  all  supplies 
for  the  Government,  and  to  adjourn  when  it  pleased.  It 
was  too  near  Stuart  times  to  take  any  risk  of  a  denial  of 
the  rights  of  the  people  by  arbitrary  power.  Other  articles 
relate  to  the  election  of  local  officers,  the  rights  of  criminals, 
and  the  power  of  Courts  to  decide  all  property  cases,  and 


CH.  v        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS        477 

pledges  the  proprietor  and  his  heirs  never  to  invade  the 
consciences  of  his  people. 

To  what  extent  did  these  settlers  mean  that  Pennsyl 
vania  should  be  a  Quaker  Colony  ?  In  so  far  as  this  would 
signify  that  Quaker  rights  and  privileges  should  be  secure, 
and  that  they  should  be  in  no  danger  from  a  renewal  of 
English  persecution,  they  undoubtedly  intended  that  the 
then  dominant  sect  should  have  the  rights  of  ordinary 
freemen.  William  Penn  expresses  this  distinctly  in  a 
semi-private  letter. 

"  I  went  thither  to  lay  the  foundation  of  a  free  colony  for  all 
mankind,  more  especially  those  of  my  own  profession ;  not  that 
I  would  lessen  the  civil  liberties  of  others  because  of  their 
persuasion,  but  screen  and  defend  our  own  from  any  infringement 
on  that  account." 

When  the  Friends  had  time  to  steady  themselves  in 
the  face  of  these  new  principles  we  find  no  attempt  to 
grasp  at  power  for  sectarian  ends  or  by  sectarian  machinery. 
The  liberties  they  claimed  for  themselves  they  granted  to 
all  others,  save  in  the  reservation  already  noted  of  the 
privileges  of  office-holding  to  Protestant  Christians,  and 
this  was  probably  forced  upon  them.  Their  demand 
for  liberty  of  conscience  included  a  freedom  to  perform 
all  the  civil  functions  of  government  without  taking  or 
administering  oaths,  and  without  being  engaged  in  any 
martial  operations  or  appropriations.  Had  all  been 
Friends  there  would  have  been  no  difficulty  in  these 
matters,  except  from  outside.  But  others  with  equal 
consistency  considered  oaths  essential,  and  fighting 
justifiable  or  meritorious.  How  were  these  views  to  be 
reconciled  ?  Practically  it  came  about  that  the  Friends 
allowed  the  oaths  and  the  militia,  but  refused  to  have 
any  part  in  them.  To  take  an  affirmation  instead  of  an 
oath  was  a  simple  matter  of  choice ;  but  there  might  be 
judicial  or  magisterial  positions,  involving  administering 
oaths  when  they  were  sanctioned  by  law,  and  there  the 
option  could  not  be  permitted.  Hence  Friends  refused 
to  allow  themselves  to  accept  such  positions. 

The  war  question  was  less  easy  of  solution.     William 


478    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

Penn  accepted  a  Charter  from  the  Crown,  which  permitted 
him — 

"  To  levy,  muster,  and  train  all  sorts  of  men  .  .  .  and  to  make 
war  and  pursue  the  enemies  and  robbers  as  well  by  sea  as  by 
land  .  .  .  and  by  God's  assistance  to  vanquish  and  take  them 
to  put  them  to  death  by  the  law  of  war,  or  save  them,  etc." 

This  was  ample  authority  for  a  Quaker  Governor,  and 
not  infrequently  there  was  a  call  made  for  him  to  exercise 
these  powers.  Usually  he  evaded  this  by  the  appointment 
of  a  deputy  who  was  not  a  Friend,  who  went  through  the 
harmless  military  motions  of  the  times  with  a  clear 
conscience. 

Then  there  were  frequent  calls  upon  the  Quaker 
legislature  for  appropriations  for  aid  against  the  French 
or  Indians.  Some  of  these  were  refused,  some  evaded, 
and  this  finally  wrought  the  downfall  of  Friendly  domina 
tion  in  the  province.  Up  to  1756  it  was  possible  to 
make  the  necessary  adjustments,  but  when  the  issue 
became  clear  and  definite  the  Friends  resigned  or  declined 
re-election. 

These  two  illustrations  serve  to  show  their  position  as 
to  government.  They  were  committed  to  it,  and  meant 
to  make  it  succeed.  They  voted,  and  were  elected  to 
office.  In  all  ordinary  political  affairs  they  were  active, 
even  adroit,  politicians.  But  they  made  their  stand  on 
a  violation  of  personal  conscience.  No  ulterior  good, 
however  plausible  or  comprehensive,  or  even  seemingly 
necessary,  could  induce  them  to  take  an  oath  or  join  a 
military  company,  because  they  deemed  that  these  were 
wrong  in  themselves,  and  hence  justified  by  no  necessity. 

Penn  and  his  heirs  held  the  governorship  by  virtue  of  the 
King's  Charter.  As  during  much  of  the  time  they  could  not 
be  present  it  was  necessary  to  appoint  deputies,  limited  in 
their  powers  by  instructions.  These  deputies  were  usually 
not  Friends,  and  after  the  death  of  Penn  and  his  widow 
they  surrounded  themselves  with  Councils,  in  which  Friends 
had  little  place.  The  Executive  management  of  the  Colony 
was  therefore  largely  out  of  Friendly  control.  But  the 


CH.V        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS        479 

Friends  had  no  serious  opposition  in  the  popularly  elected 
legislative  assembly  so  long  as  they  chose  to  seek  places 
there.  In  the  local  offices  of  the  three  south-eastern 
counties  they,  by  inherent  fitness  and  the  popular  choice, 
held  everything  to  which  their  scruples  presented  no  bar. 

These  conditions  made  Pennsylvania  for  about  seventy 
years  a  Quaker  province.  There  was  enough  opposition 
and  enough  diversity  to  make  interesting  problems,  and 
to  test  the  idea  that  the  political  principles  and  methods, 
which  naturally  result  from  their  theological  and  moral 
ideals,  were  adapted  to  practical  conditions.  There  never 
has  been  before  or  since  any  other  opportunity  where  they 
had  even  an  approximate  chance  to  sway  the  destinies  of 
a  State  for  any  considerable  length  of  time. 

We  will  now  take  up  more  consecutively  the  affairs  of 
the  State  so  far  as  they  were  determined  by  the  activities 
of  Friends. 

After  the  first  burst  of  good  feeling,  resulting  from  the 
new  opportunities  and  the  presence  and  leadership  of  Penn, 
had  exhausted  itself,  the  difficulties  and  bickerings  began. 
A  little  body  of  English  churchmen  were  evidently  intent 
on  grasping  something  of  the  pre-eminence  they  held  in 
England,  and  sent  home  reports  discrediting  the  manage 
ment.  The  Friends  themselves,  unused  to  political  control, 
seemed  to  have  exaggerated  ideas  of  their  personal  rights, 
and  to  have  become  unduly  suspicious  of  all  authority. 

After  the  founder's  short  stay  in  the  province  Thomas 
Lloyd  was  the  leader,  both  in  Church  and  State,  of  the 
Friendly  forces.  Penn  made  him,  either  alone  or  as 
chairman  of  a  Board,  his  deputy,  as  long  as  he  would 
accept  the  place.  Under  his  administration  matters  went 
smoothly.  The  same  men  led  both  in  meeting  and  politics, 
and  so  we  find  them  adjusting  their  appointments  by 
changing  the  hour  of  meeting  to  suit  the  "  Court "  and 
otherwise.  The  most  of  the  State  leaders  were  ministers, 
and  they  seem  to  have  drawn  no  definite  line  which  would 
indicate  that  one  side  of  their  work  was  more  religious  or 
more  secular  than  the  other. 

In  1688  Thomas  Lloyd  became  tired  of  the  responsi- 


480    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

bility  of  government.  Penn  appointed  John  Blackwell,  a 
Cromwellian  soldier,  whom  he  describes  as  "  not  a  Friend, 
but  a  grave,  sober,  wise  man."  The  first  two  adjectives 
may  be  true,  but  the  hot  fight  he  immediately  found  on 
his  hands  from  Quaker  opposition  makes  us  doubt  the 
applicability  of  the  third.  The  transformation  from  the 
submissive  martyr  of  England  to  the  noisy  defendant  of 
popular  rights  in  Pennsylvania  is  also  instructive.  Here 
is  one  of  several  turbulent  scenes  in  the  Council. 

"The  Governor  [Blackwell]  declared  ye  Council  to  be 
adjourned  till  ye  next  council  day,  .  .  .  and  rose  up  out  of  his 
place  to  depart  accordingly  ;  upon  which  several  members  of  ye 
Council  departed.  But  divers  remayned,  and  a  great  deal  of 
confused  noise  and  clamour  was  expressed  at,  and  without  the 
doore  of  the  Governor's  roome  where  ye  Council  had  sat,  which 
occasioned  persons  (passing  by  in  the  street)  to  stand  still  to 
heare,  which  the  Governor  observing,  desired  the  said  Thomas 
Lloyd  would  forbear  such  loud  talking,  telling  him  he  must  not 
suffer  such  doings,  but  would  take  a  course  to  suppress  it,  etc.,  etc." 

The  Governor  could  not  manage  the  situation,  and  was 
removed  by  the  proprietor,  and  again  Lloyd  came  into 
power. 

In  1689  there  occurred  the  first  of  many  difficulties 
due  to  Quaker  scruples  on  the  subject  of  warfare. 
Blackwell  had  asked  aid  of  the  Council,  then  partly 
Friendly,  in  providing  defence  against  an  apprehended 
war  with  France.  John  Simcock,  a  minister,  could  see 
"no  danger  but  from  bears  and  wolves."  Samuel 
Carpenter,  then  laying  the  foundation  for  his  great 
business  career,  took  the  position  that  he  would  have 
nothing  to  do  with  it.  "  I  would  rather  be  ruined  than 
violate  my  conscience."  But  he  would  not  tie  the  hands 
of  the  Governor  if  he  felt  that  something  should  be  done. 
To  this  his  Quaker  associates  assented,  and  this  seemed 
generally  the  position  of  the  Friends.  If  others  wanted 
to  defend  themselves  they  would  interpose  no  barrier, 
but  they  would  not  join  in  it  themselves,  for  it  would 
violate  their  consciences.  They  would  not  use  arms 
themselves  or  vote  supplies  for  others. 


CH.V        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS         481 

The  recall  of  Blackwell  came  in  opportunely,  and  the 
French  danger  also  disappeared,  so  that  this  test  was 
not  brought  to  an  issue. 

Of  the  ecclesiastical  results  of  the  schism  created  by 
George  Keith,  we  have  already  spoken.  His  teachings 
added  one  more  to  the  political  distractions  which 
were  discrediting  the  province.  His  attacks  upon  the 
Quaker  leaders  were  vigorous  and  eloquent.  Thomas 
Lloyd  was  especially  an  object,  and  it  was  impossible 
in  those  days  to  separate  religious  from  political 
prejudices.  The  Keithian  and  Foxian  Quakers  became 
convenient  terms  for  parties  in  the  state.  Keith's 
claim  that  no  Friends  could  consistently  use  any  force 
in  affairs  of  government  created  a  new  issue  ;  and  his 
demand,  resulting  logically  from  it,  that  all  members 
should  resign  their  magistracies  and  other  executive 
positions  would  have  broken  up  the  Quaker  experiment. 
His  party  in  politics  lived  for  a  decade,  and  then  slowly 
disappeared  ;  but  his  friends  formed  a  group  opposed  to 
the  proprietor,  and  ready  for  years  to  come  to  unite  with 
any  opposition  which  should  form  itself. 

These  unhappy  disturbances,  magnified  in  England, 
and  Penn's  unfortunate  friendship  for  the  exiled  King 
James  brought  about  in  1692  the  confiscation  by  the 
Crown  for  two  years  of  Penn's  control  of  the  government, 
The  governorship  was  placed  in  the  hands  of  Benjamin 
Fletcher,  then  also  Governor  of  New  York.  He  was 
supported  by  the  churchmen  and  Keithians,  while  the 
Friends,  as  under  Blackwell,  made  a  troublesome  and 
vigorous  opposition.  They  still  controlled  the  Legis 
lature,  and  the  two  parties  managed  to  block  each  others' 
hands  till  Penn  regained  his  hold  on  the  province  and  to 
a  large  extent  his  influence  in  London.  Politics  moved 
quietly  along  till  in  1699  he  found  it  again  possible  to 
visit  his  province. 

He  found  a  colony  which  politically  seemed  unwhole- 
somely  full  of  bickerings.  The  people  were  tyros  in 
government.  The  Friends  had  been  divided  among 
themselves.  A  little  later  he  wrote,  advising  his  secretary 

2  I 


482    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

to  send  some  of  the  chief  men  of  the  colony  to  England, 
so  that  they  might  find  how  insignificant  they  were. 
They  were  trying  to  carry  points  and  create  parties 
entirely  out  of  proportion  to  the  importance  of  the  issues 
involved,  and  this  condition  was  to  continue  for  another 
decade. 

Penn  himself  was  in  deep  financial  trouble  though,  as 
a  partial  excuse  for  his  colonists'  baffling  policy,  they  did 
not  know  it. 

His  steward  had  fraudulently  involved  him  in  debt  far 
out  of  his  ability  to  manage  unless  his  Pennsylvania 
property  could  be  made  productive.  Indeed  when  he 
came  over  his  whole  interest  in  the  colony  had  been  con 
veyed  to  Philip  Ford,  and  leased  from  him  again  so  that 
he  could  collect  his  quit-rents  and  encourage  immigration. 
This  explains  his  almost  frantic  appeals  for  the  money 
which  was  his  due,  and  which  his  political  opponents 
were  using  to  harass  him  and  drive  additional  bargains, 
not  only  for  political  but  also  for  commercial  privileges. 

The  contrast  between  the  high  hopes  in  his  first  visit 
and  the  mean  and  mercenary  troubles  of  the  second  would 
have  broken  the  enthusiasm  of  an  ordinary  man.  Yet  it 
does  not  seem  to  have  done  so  with  him.  "  The  more  he 
is  pressed  the  more  he  rises,"  said  his  best  Pennsylvania 
friend,  Isaac  Norris.  "  Friends,"  Penn  said  to  the  Legis 
lature,  "  if  there  is  anything  in  the  Charter  that  jars,  alter 
it  ...  I  desire  to  see  mine,  no  other  than  in  the  people's 
prosperity." 

And  the  people's  prosperity  was  justifying  him.  The 
political  troubles  were  on  the  surface.  Friends  and  others 
were  flocking  in.  They  were  building  their  houses  and 
clearing  the  lands.  They  were  establishing  Meetings  and 
were  coming  together  semi-weekly  in  the  fear  of  God. 
To  an  outside  observer  who  could  fairly  judge,  the 
solidity  of  the  state  was  established  under  Penn's  benign 
institutions,  and  the  quarrels  which  make  up  history  were 
only  the  froth.  Two  busy  years  of  Penn's  forceful 
personality  cleared  away  many  difficulties.  He  gave  the 
province,  the  city,  and  the  school  new  charters.  He 


CH.  v        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS         483 

bought  additional  land  of  the  Indians,  and  cemented  their 
bonds  with  the  whites.  He  preached  in  the  Meetings 
and  straightened  out  the  church  affairs  ;  and  he  went 
through  an  immense  amount  of  detail,  as  to  property 
lines,  local  offices,  and  public  bridges  and  roads.  Could 
he  have  remained,  much  of  the  subsequent  unedifying 
politics  would  never  have  had  to  be  recorded. 

When  Penn  left  the  province  in  1701  three  political 
parties  sprang  into  existence.  With  the  churchmen 
we  need  have  little  to  do.  They  demanded  military 
defence  and  oaths,  but  were  more  of  an  obstacle  to  the 
Pennsylvanians  by  their  reports  sent  to  London  than  by 
their  direct  influence.  They  were  led  by  certain  Crown 
officials  not  under  provincial  authority,  whose  following 
was  limited  in  numbers,  but  just  at  present  was  reinforced 
by  the  remnants  of  the  Keithians. 

The  Friends  were  strong  enough  to  divide.  They 
were  now  but  little  if  any  more  than  a  majority  of  the 
inhabitants,  but  in  character,  influence,  and  historic  claims 
constituted  the  potent  social  and  political  forces  of  the 
State. 

One  of  the  parties  was  made  up  of  friends  of  the 
proprietor,  the  best  educated,  most  wealthy,  and  most 
responsible  citizens.  Their  strength  was  largely  in 
Philadelphia,  but  they  had  their  representatives  through 
the  Counties.  Their  agent,  and  in  time  their  leader, 
was  James  Logan,  the  secretary  of  William  Penn. 

He  had  come  with  his  "  master  "  on  the  same  boat  in 
1699,  a  young  Friend  of  twenty-six  years.  For  a  half- 
century  he  was  a  most  potent  factor  in  provincial  affairs. 
Perfectly  faithful  to  the  Penn  family,  scholarly  and  genial 
among  his  friends,  but  harsh  and  unfair  in  his  judgment 
of  his  enemies,  he  was  for  the  coming  years  the  centre 
of  the  volcanic  disturbances  which  afflicted  the  colony. 
His  standing  among  Friends  was  not  very  secure.  He 
believed  in  defensive  war,  and  was  intolerant  of  their 
narrow  distinctions.  He  managed  the  Indian  affairs 
with  great  skill  and  quite  in  the  spirit  of  the  founder. 
Later  he  became  more  placable  and  settled  down  at 


484    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

Stenton  into  an  honoured  age,  devoted  to  literature  and 
science. 

The  leader  of  the  opposition  was  David  Lloyd,  a  Welsh 
man  of  remarkable  ability.  His  standing  as  a  Friend  was 
better  than  Logan's.  He  was  fully  devoted  to  their  extreme 
views  concerning  war  and  oaths.  He  was  an  intense 
democrat,  a  stout  champion  of  popular  rights,  a  shrewd 
politician,  a  man  who,  if  any,  deserves  the  name  of  the 
first  Pennsylvania  "  boss."  He  marshalled  the  country 
Friends  against  the  aristocratic  tendencies  of  the  pro 
prietary  party,  and  opposed  with  vigour  and  success  any 
increase  of  its  prerogatives. 

Some  of  his  methods  seem  at  this  distance  unjustifi 
able.  His  attacks  upon  Penn  were,  at  least,  ungenerous, 
and  probably  grossly  exaggerated  the  grievances.  His 
enemies  gave  him  ample  material  for  attack,  of  which  he 
made  skilful  and  generally  legitimate  use. 

Penn  had  made  a  young  man  named  John  Evans  his 
Deputy-Governor.  As  usual  with  Penn's  appointees,  this 
was  an  unfortunate  selection.  Evans  was  capable  but 
indiscreet  and  something  of  a  libertine.  He  imprisoned 
a  critical  member  of  the  Assembly.  He  tried  to  discredit 
the  Friends  by  bringing  a  false  alarm  of  a  French 
invasion  so  that  they  would  disown  their  principles.  He 
collected  "  powder  money  "  by  a  tax  on  commerce,  alike 
burdensome  and  illegal.  In  many  ways  he  showed  his 
inability  to  succeed  in  a  province  of  Friends.  Penn's 
supporters  hung  their  heads  and  Lloyd  triumphed. 

These  conditions  existed  until  1710,  when  a  complete 
revulsion  of  feeling  in  favour  of  Penn  came  about. 
Evans  had  now  been  superseded,  and  the  province  had,  or 
hoped  to  have,  a  sober  and  acceptable  Deputy-Governor. 
Every  member,  without  an  exception,  of  Lloyd's  assembly 
was  defeated,  and  a  loyal  and  responsible  house  gave  the 
people  a  taste  of  sane  progress. 

They  had  had  for  the  time,  at  least,  enough  of  petty 
quarrelling.  They  had  found  that  their  founder  had 
been  considering  the  sale  of  his  possessions  to  the  Crown, 
and  had  only  held  back  because  he  could  not  sufficiently 


CH.V        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS        485 

protect  their  rights.  While  they  had  been  complaining 
of  little  evils  and  treating  him  most  shamefully  he  had 
been  sacrificing  his  own  interests  to  protect  theirs  ;  and 
when  after  the  election  he  sent  them  a  letter  full  of  kindly 
advice,  a  pathetic  plea  for  friendliness  and  sympathy,  it 
was  everywhere  read,  and  the  heart  of  the  people  went 
out  as  one  man  to  their  generous  and  statesmanlike 
leader. 

It  did  not  come  any  too  soon.  William  Penn  had 
two  years  of  normal  life  in  which  to  enjoy  the  loyalty 
and  respect  of  his  people.  His  troubles  with  his  steward 
were  also  over,  and  his  American  property  was  beginning 
to  yield  a  comfortable  income.  His  acceptance  among 
his  English  Friends  of  all  classes  was  also  much  more 
cordial,  and  the  tongue  of  calumny  was  silenced.  He 
was  about  to  complete  his  arrangements  for  the  sale  of 
his  privileges  in  Pennsylvania  to  the  Crown,  with  the 
rights  and  scruples  of  his  colonists  fairly  protected,  when 
a  stroke  of  paralysis  prostrated  him,  and  the  transaction 
was  never  completed.  He  lingered  for  almost  six  years, 
his  mind  weakened  but  his  sense  of  the  Divine  presence 
unimpaired.  During  this  time,  and  until  his  death,  his 
Pennsylvania  affairs  were  managed  by  his  wife,  Hannah 
Callowhill  Penn. 

We  now  enter  upon  the  happy  period  of  Friendly 
control  of  government.  For  thirty  years  following  1710 
we  have  a  state,  satisfied,  at  peace,  enjoying  popular  liberty 
and  security  for  its  continuance.  It  was  prosperous,  too, 
beyond  precedent.  The  ravaged  and  outraged  dwellers 
in  the  Rhine  Valley,  the  battle-ground  of  Europe,  the 
vigorous  Presbyterians  of  Ulster  who  were  threatened 
with  the  invasions  of  Episcopacy,  heard  of  a  land  where 
wars  were  unknown,  where  taxes  were  light,  where  land 
was  plentiful  and  cheap,  and  where  every  man  worshipped 
as  he  pleased.  The  streams  from  both  lands,  little 
rivulets  at  first,  but  strengthening  with  each  decade, 
settled  the  province  at  an  unprecedentedly  rapid  rate. 
The  government  was  simple  and  inexpensive,  making  very 
light  demands  upon  the  people.  Fortunately  England 


486    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

made  no  calls  on  her  colonies  for  warlike  aid.  Oaths 
were  settled  so  that  the  question  made  no  trouble.  The 
wise  arrangements  of  Logan  kept  peace  and  amity  with 
the  Indians.  A  scheme  of  paper  money  supplied  the 
medium  to  pay  for  the  importations  of  a  growing  colony, 
yet  was  so  cautiously  issued,  that  Pennsylvania  probably 
alone  among  the  provinces  always  maintained  it  at  par. 
The  parties  of  the  early  days  were  forgotten.  Lloyd 
and  Logan  preserved,  if  not  friendship,  at  least  decorous 
intercourse.  The  Friends  carried  everything  their  own 
way  in  the  state,  the  Governors  selected  by  Hannah  Penn 
being  wisely  responsive  to  prevailing  desires  and  their 
councils  made  up  of  judicious  and  clear-headed  men. 
The  popular  assembly  was  easily  theirs  by  its  quiet, 
scrupulous  management  of  affairs  and  the  aid  of  the 
German  vote.  The  days  that  Penn  had  dreamed  of  had 
been  as  nearly  realised  as  one  has  a  right  to  expect  of 
dreams.  They  were  days  of  which  the  annals  are  so 
uninteresting  as  to  take  but  little  space  in  history,  and 
yet  in  which  the  ends  of  government  were  better  subserved 
than  in  times  of  internal  strife  and  external  warfare. 

All  that  Penn  had  striven  for  had  not  been  perfectly 
secured.  His  gentle  penal  code  had  gone  a  sacrifice 
to  political  expediency.  Oaths  were  given  and  taken, 
though  not  by  Friends.  Catholics  were  allowed  to 
worship  as  nowhere  else  among  the  Colonies,  but  they 
could  not  hold  office  or  corporate  title  to  property. 
There  were  malefactors,  ungodly  and  immoral  people 
who  were  hardly  restrained.  It  was  not  ideal,  but  as 
near  to  it  as  a  reasonable  person  would  expect. 

Andrew  Hamilton,  the  great  lawyer  of  the  province, 
when  he  resigned  the  speakership  of  the  Assembly  in 
1739,  thus  sums  up  the  conditions: 

"  It  is  not  to  the  fertility  of  our  soil,  and  the  commodiousness 
of  our  rivers,  that  we  ought  chiefly  to  attribute  the  great  progress 
this  province  has  made  within  so  small  a  compass  of  years,  in 
improvements,  wealth,  trade,  and  navigation ;  and  the  extra 
ordinary  increase  of  people  who  have  been  drawn  here  from 
almost  every  country  in  Europe ; — a  progress  which  more  ancient 


CH.  v        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS        487 

settlements  on  the  main  of  America  cannot,  at  the  present, 
boast  of.  No.  It  is  principally  and  almost  wholly  owing  to 
the  excellency  of  our  constitution,  under  which  we  enjoy  a 
greater  share  both  of  civil  and  religious  liberty  than  any  of  our 
neighbors. 

"  It  is  our  great  happiness  that  instead  of  triennial  assemblies, 
a  privilege  which  several  other  colonies  have  long  endeavored 
to  obtain  but  in  vain,  ours  are  annual,  and  for  that  reason  as 
well  as  others  less  liable  to  be  practised  upon  or  corrupted 
either  with  money  or  presents.  We  sit  upon  our  own  adjourn 
ments  when  we  please  and  as  long  as  we  think  necessary  and 
are  not  to  be  sent  a-packing  in  the  middle  of  a  debate,  and 
disabled  from  representing  our  just  grievances  to  our  gracious 
sovereign. 

"  We  have  no  officers  but  what  are  necessary,  none  but  what 
earn  their  salaries,  and  those  generally  are  either  elected  by  the 
people  or  appointed  by  their  representatives. 

"Our  foreign  trade  and  shipping  are  free  from  all  imposts 
except  those  small  duties  payable  to  his  majesty  by  the  statute 
of  the  law  of  Great  Britain.  The  taxes  which  we  pay  for 
carrying  on  the  public  service  are  inconsiderable,  for  the  sole 
power  of  raising  and  disposing  of  the  public  money  for  the 
public  service  is  lodged  in  the  assembly  who  appoint  their 
own  treasurer,  and  to  them  alone  he  is  accountable.  Other 
incidental  taxes  are  assessed,  collected,  and  applied  by  persons 
annually  chosen  by  the  people  themselves.  Such  is  our  happy 
state  as  to  civil  rights.  Nor  are  we  less  happy  in  the  employ 
ment  of  a  perfect  freedom  as  to  religion.  By  many  years' 
experience,  we  find  that  an  equality  among  religious  societies, 
without  distinguishing  any  one  sect  with  greater  privileges  than 
another,  is  the  most  effectual  method  to  discourage  hypocrisy, 
promote  the  practice  of  the  moral  virtues,  and  prevent  the 
plagues  and  mischiefs  that  always  attend  religious  squabbling. 

"This  is  our  constitution,  and  this  constitution  was  framed 
by  the  wisdom  of  Mr.  Penn,  the  first  proprietary  and  founder 
of  this  province,  whose  charter  of  privilege  to  the  inhabitants  of 
Pennsylvania  will  ever  remain  a  monument  of  his  benevolence 
to  mankind,  and  reflect  more  lasting  honor  on  his  descendants 
than  the  largest  possessions  in  the  framing  of  this  government. 
He  reserved  no  powers  to  himself  or  his  heirs  to  oppress  the 
people,  no  authority  but  what  is  necessary  for  our  protection, 
and  to  hinder  us  from  falling  into  anarchy,  and,  therefore 
(supposing  we  could  persuade  ourselves  that  all  our  obligations 
to  our  great  lawgiver,  and  his  honorable  descendants,  were 
entirely  cancelled),  yet  our  own  interests  should  oblige  us 


488    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

carefully  to  support  the  government  on  its  present  foundation, 
as  the  only  means  to  secure  to  ourselves  a  prosperity,  the 
enjoyments  of  those  privileges,  and  the  blessings  flowing  from 
such  a  constitution,  under  which  we  cannot  fail  of  being  happy 
if  the  fault  be  not  our  own." 

Hamilton  was  succeeded  as  Speaker  by  John  Kinsey, 
the  Clerk  of  the  Yearly  Meeting.  He  also  became  in  a 
few  years  the  Chief-Justice  in  the  province,  and  held  the 
three  offices  combining  leadership  in  Church  and  State 
till  his  death. 

Times  were  coming  when  the  political  policy  of  the 
Friends  needed  wisest  direction.  Though  they  did  not 
know  it,  their  days  of  easy  supremacy  were  about  over. 
The  experience  and  the  entrenched  power  gained  by  the 
thirty  years  of  peace  and  prosperity  carried  them  along 
through  fifteen  years  more  of  troubled  politics,  and  then 
came  the  end  of  official  control. 

The  troubles  centred  partly  around  the  Quaker 
attitude  toward  war.  To  appreciate  this  we  will  retrace 
our  history  and  mention  a  few  instances. 

Governor  Fletcher  in  1693  wanted  money  for  a 
French  war.  He  promised  that  the  appropriation  should 
be  used  for  other  purposes  and  not  "dipt  in  blood." 
Though  this  was  really  an  evasion  the  vote  was  given.  In 
1701  the  Assembly  assured  the  King  that  they  would 
acquiesce  in  his  requests  for  money  "so  far  as  our 
religious  persuasions  shall  permit,"  and  voted  nothing. 
Governor  Evans  made  frequent  requests  for  a  militia, 
but  the  Assembly  went  no  further  than  to  suggest  to 
him  that  he  had  authority  as  Deputy-Governor  to  form  a 
voluntary  organisation,  which,  however,  did  not  prosper. 

In  1709  Governor  Gookin  asked  for  150  soldiers 
from  Pennsylvania  to  join  the  quotas  of  the  other  states, 
or  in  lieu  of  them  £4000  of  money.  This  was  a  serious 
proposition,  for  war  was  an  actual  fact.  The  Friends  in 
Council  and  Assembly  met  and  debated  the  question. 
The  former,  the  Logan  party,  were  of  the  opinion  that 
though  they  could  not  vote  war  supplies,  they  must  support 
the  general  government  by  a  present  to  the  Queen.  To 


CH.V        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS        489 

this  the  Assembly  agreed,  with  the  promise  that  it  should 
be  placed  in  safe  hands  till  they  were  satisfied  that  it 
would  not  be  used  for  war.  This  was  David  Lloyd's 
amendment  to  the  Logan  proposition,  and  when  the 
Governor  refused  to  accept  it  with  the  condition,  the  house 
abruptly  adjourned  without  his  consent 

When  the  Logan  party  came  into  power  in  1711 
they  voted  £2000  "  for  the  Queen's  use  "  in  response  to 
a  demand  for  a  military  expedition,  though  as  a  matter 
of  fact  it  was  not  used  for  that  purpose.  Isaac  Norris 
says  :  "  We  did  not  see  it  to  be  inconsistent  with  our 
principles  to  give  the  Queen  money  notwithstanding 
any  use  she  might  put  it  to,  that  not  being  our  part, 
but  hers." 

This  seems  to  have  been  the  attitude  of  the  Friends' 
Assembly  in  the  days  to  come.  The  grasping  and  unfair 
policy  of  the  sons  of  William  Penn  embittered  the  Indians. 
The  wars  between  England  and  France  were  reproduced 
among  the  Indian  tribes,  and  French  intrigue  took 
advantage  of  their  excited  state  to  inflame  them  against 
the  English  colonists.  Military  defence  or  the  abandon 
ment  of  the  frontiersmen  to  Indian  cruelty  seemed  the 
only  alternatives.  The  legislators  would  assert  their 
peaceable  principles  and  their  conscience  against  personal 
participation,  and  would  then  vote  money  "  for  the  King's 
use."  The  Governor  would  use  it  to  build  forts,  or  to 
feed  the  militia,  or  buy  munitions  of  war.  It  is  true  that 
the  causes  of  the  wars  were  entirely  out  of  their  control, 
and  not  only  so,  but,  in  so  far  as  they  could,  they  had 
opposed  them.  The  wars  were  the  result  of  measures 
which  had  had  their  earnest  but  ineffectual  resistance. 
When  William  Penn  or  James  Logan  bought  Indian  lands, 
the  Indians  were  fully  satisfied,  and  went  home  without 
the  least  feeling  of  hostility.  But  when  Thomas  Penn 
devised  his  infamous  "  Walking  Purchase "  to  cheat  the 
Minisinks  out  of  their  ancestral  homes  against  their 
consent,  by  methods  which  they  well  knew  were  fraudu 
lent,  he  absolved  them  from  their  loyalty  to  the  white 
settlers,  and  they  bided  their  time  for  revenge. 


490    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

This  did  not  come  for  a  few  years.  In  the  meantime 
other  troubles  arose.  In  1739  England  and  Spain 
declared  war.  Governor  Thomas  asked  for  an  appropria 
tion  to  protect  the  province  against  a  probable  attack. 
This  opened  a  paper  discussion  between  the  Governor 
and  the  Assembly  led  by  John  Kinsey,  in  which  the 
possibility  of  conducting  a  province  without  war  was  dis 
cussed  with  some  bitterness  and  considerable  ability  by 
both  sides.  In  the  first  reply  of  the  Assembly  they 
remind  the  Governor  that  most  of  them  were  "  of  the 
people  called  Quakers,  and  principled  against  bearing 
arms  in  any  case  whatsoever."  As  to  other  people  they 
said  that  it  would  not  be  fair  to  throw  burdens  upon  them 
from  which  the  Friends  were  relieved,  and  they  suggest 
that  the  Governor  make  the  service  voluntary.  They 
intimate  that  rather  than  show  any  complicity  they  would 
trust  the  defence  of  the  province  to  that  power  which 
"not  only  calms  the  raging  waves  of  the  sea,  but  sets 
limits  beyond  which  they  cannot  pass." 

The  Governor  replied  that  this  did  not  relieve  them 
of  the  necessity  for  defence — that  sailors  must  furl  their 
sails  in  a  storm  even  though  they  trusted  in  a  Divine 
Protector,  He  suggested  that  they  did  not  hesitate 
to  put  a  burglar  to  death,  and  that  there  was  no  logical 
difference  between  this  act  and  more  extended  resistance 
to  an  army  which  would  attack  their  persons  and 
property. 

To  this  last  point  they  objected  that  the  burglar  was 
doing  a  conscious  wrong  while  the  men  in  the  army  were 
probably  innocent  of  any  criminal  intent. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  go  through  the  discussion.  It 
wound  up  with  a  statement  from  the  Governor  that 
Quaker  principles  were  inconsistent  with  government, 
and  he  followed  this  by  a  recommendation  to  England 
that  the  Friends  should  be  made  ineligible  to  office. 

James  Logan  advised  the  Yearly  Meeting  to  the  same 
effect,  suggesting  that  all  Friends  who  held  such  scruples 
should  voluntarily  resign,  but  that  body  refused  to  permit 
the  paper  to  be  read. 


CH.V        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS         491 

The  total  result  was  a  Quaker  triumph.  They  refused 
the  appropriation.  They  strengthened  their  hold  on  the 
legislature,  and  brought  the  Governor  to  terms  by  a 
refusal  to  vote  him  a  salary,  and  they  probably  had  the 
better  of  the  argument.  The  pious  reflections  and  adroit 
political  argument  of  John  Kinsey  had  carried  the  day. 

The  excitement  lasted  through  several  years,  and 
culminated  in  a  street  fight  in  1742,  when  a  number  of 
sailors  tried  to  raid  the  polls  in  the  interest  of  the 
Governor's  party,  and  a  bunch  of  hard-fisted  Germans 
stood  by  the  Assembly.  In  both  the  street  fight  and 
the  elections  the  Quakers  triumphed. 

The  Spanish  war  was  soon  over,  but  one  with  France 
immediately  followed.  In  1745  the  Assembly,  again 
declaring  their  peaceable  principles,  but  recognising  their 
duty  "  to  give  tribute  to  Caesar,"  voted  ^4000  for  "  bread, 
beef,  pork,  flour,  wheat,  and  other  grains "  in  lieu  of 
military  supplies.  The  Governor  is  said  to  have  con 
strued  the  "  other  grain  "  to  mean  gunpowder.  French 
wars  were  now  almost  continuous,  and  again  and  again 
money  was  voted  "  for  the  King's  use,"  always,  however, 
receiving  for  it  some  addition  to  their  political  liberties 
and  powers. 

John  Kinsey  died  in  1750.  He  had  no  successor 
capable  of  coping  with  conditions  within  and  without 
the  Society  of  Friends,  and  the  affairs  of  the  "  Quaker 
Party  "  fell  largely  into  the  hands  of  Benjamin  Franklin, 
who  had  no  sympathy  with  their  anti-martial  views. 
He  writes  of  the  Friends  in  1747  as  "that  wealthy 
and  powerful  body  of  people  who  have  governed  our 
elections  and  filled  almost  every  seat  in  the  Assembly." 

Hitherto  the  wars  had  been  outside  the  province,  but 
when  Braddock's  army  went  down  to  defeat  before  Fort 
Du  Quesne  in  1755  the  exasperated  Indians  were  let 
loose  on  the  frontiers.  During  this  time  of  anxiety  and 
real  suffering  the  annual  election  for  the  Assembly  came, 
and  again  Friends  had  an  overwhelming  majority. 

Philadelphia  Quarterly  Meeting,  writing  to  the  London 
Meeting  for  Sufferings  in  explanation  of  the  situation, 


492    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

says  that  many  of  their  members  had  declined  executive 
and  some  legislative  positions,  and  more  would  do  so 
if  there  were  others  on  whose  probity  and  principles 
they  could  rely  to  take  their  places.  Though  they  were 
now  a  small  minority  of  the  population,  yet  such  was  the 
confidence  reposed  in  them  that  even  in  the  back  districts 
where  but  few  Friends  resided,  these  were  generally 
chosen  by  the  votes  of  others.  They  add : 

"It  is  remarkable  that  for  16  years  successively,  more  than 
half  of  which  was  a  time  of  war,  a  set  of  men  conscientiously 
principled  against  warlike  measures  have  been  chosen  by  those 
of  whom  the  majority  were  not  in  that  particular  of  the  same 
principle." 

Thus  being  honourably  the  recipients  of  the  confidence 
and  support  of  the  Colony,  they  could  not  properly  evade 
a  manifest  duty. 

Many  of  the  more  spiritual  Friends  did  not,  however, 
take  this  position.  The  votes  for  warlike  defence, 
imposing  a  tax  which  some  of  their  members  could  not 
conscientiously  pay,  were  too  much  like  temporising  to 
suit  the  Quaker  regard  for  plain  dealing.  They  urged 
their  brethren  to  withdraw  from  a  government  which 
involved  such  inconsistency. 

This  tendency  was  strengthened  by  the  English 
Friends.  Dr.  Fothergill  and  David  Barclay  came  into 
possession  of  information  which  led  them  to  believe  that 
the  Ministry  were  about  to  introduce  a  bill  requiring  an 
oath  of  all  Colonial  officials.  The  real  object  of  this 
was  to  drive  Friends  from  public  life.  By  their  explana 
tions  they  secured  a  stay  of  this  purpose  by  the  promise 
that  they  would  use  their  influence  to  have  the  Penn 
sylvania  legislators  who  were  Friends  withdraw  from  the 
house.  A  delegation  from  London  Yearly  Meeting  was 
sent  over  to  enforce  by  urgent  representation  this  course 
of  action. 

It  found  matters  ripe  for  the  purpose.  The  Governor 
and  his  council,  the  Quaker  member,  William  Logan, 
alone  dissenting,  had  declared  war  against  the  Delaware  and 


CH.V        THE  FRIENDS  AS  POLITICIANS         493 

Shawnee  Indians,  and  for  the  first  time  in  its  history  the 
province  was  actually  at  war.  Certain  Friends  immedi 
ately  resigned  their  places  in  the  Assembly,  and  when 
the  Englishmen  arrived  a  number  of  others  declined 
re-election. 

Thus  ended  in  1756  the  Quaker  regime.  They  could 
not  carry  on  a  state  at  war.  Had  they  had  executive 
control  they  would  have  pacified  the  Indians  as  they  did 
privately  a  few  years  later.  But  all  they  could  do  was  to 
vote  supplies  for  a  war  not  of  their  creation,  or  be  held 
responsible  for  cruel  massacres  of  innocent  people  on  the 
frontier.  Their  Yearly  Meeting  gave  no  uncertain  sound. 
It  fully  endorsed  the  action  of  London  Friends  and  asked 
all  its  members  to  keep  out  of  compromising  offices. 
Committees  of  Monthly  Meetings  laboured  incessantly  to 
bring  this  about.  Some  officials  were  defiant,  many 
reluctant,  but  notwithstanding  the  evident  wishes  of  the 
people  who  again  and  again  would  have  sent  up  Friends, 
they  managed  to  keep  them  down  to  a  minority  of  the 
Assembly,  though  Isaac  Norris  second,  George  Ashbridge, 
and  others  continued  their  useful  careers  in  public  life  till 
their  deaths. 

The  "  Quaker  Party,"  however,  did  not  die.  Under 
new  leaders,  and  supported  by  the  same  voters,  it  con 
trolled  the  province  till  the  Revolution  in  1776  threw 
down  all  the  old  lines.  It  was  always  the  liberty  party 
of  the  province,  whether  led  by  Lloyd  and  Kinsey  or  by 
Franklin.  It  wrested  from  proprietary  and  Crown  one 
accession  of  privilege  after  another,  and  Pennsylvania 
never  knew  tyranny.  The  spirit  of  William  Penn  never 
deserted  it.  His  name  and  principles  grew  in  power  with 
every  decade.  While  Friends  did  not  hold  the  offices 
their  opponents  said  that  they  still  controlled  the  govern 
ment  through  "  Quakerised "  Episcopalians  and  Presby 
terians. 

In  the  early  days  of  the  province  the  opposition  came 
from  the  Episcopalians  with  such  transient  aid  as  they 
could  receive  from  the  Keithians  and  other  malcontents. 
But  by  the  end  of  the  thirty  years'  peace  a  new  element, 


494    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

even  more  inimical  to  Quakerism,  was  making  itself  felt 
in  the  province  and  constituted  a  rapidly  growing  power. 

The  Presbyterians  from  the  north  of  Ireland,  "  Scotch 
Irishmen  "  as  they  were  called,  during  the  decades  just 
prior  to  the  Revolution  were  coming  in,  in  thousands. 
They  pressed  for  the  frontiers  and  bore  the  brunt  of 
Indian  attack.  Except  on  the  principle  that  the  Indians 
should  be  killed  or  crowded  out,  a  worse  contact  could 
not  have  been  devised.  The  Germans  who  constituted 
the  central  belt  generally  were  peaceable  and  just.  But 
"  why  should  these  heathens  have  lands  which  Christians 
want?"  demanded  the  militant,  vigorous  descendants  of 
the  Covenanters.  In  habit  of  thought  and  life,  in  doctrine 
and  testimony,  they  were  the  direct  opposite  of  the 
Friends,  whom  they  considered  to  be  altogether  nerveless 
and  despicable.  They  had  some  just  grounds  for  opposi 
tion.  When  the  new  counties  came  in  they  were  not 
accorded  proportionate  representation,  and  this  aided  in 
maintaining  Friendly  ascendancy  in  the  Assembly.  But 
their  other  claims  for  rewards  for  Indian  scalps  and  a 
vigorous  policy  of  Indian  extinction  probably  made  the 
Friends  feel  that  they  were  justified  in  not  admitting  such 
antagonistic  elements  to  a  large  share  of  the  government. 
Until  the  Revolution  the  Quakers  and  the  Presbyterians 
constituted  the  rival  political  forces  of  the  province.  The 
Episcopalians  tended  towards  the  Friends,  and  the  Germans 
were  also  usually  sympathetic. 

These  forces  maintained  the  ascendancy  till  1776,  but 
the  Revolution  was  three  parts  out  of  four  a  Scotch- 
Irish  movement  in  Pennsylvania. 


CHAPTER    VI 

FRIENDS    AND    THE   INDIANS 

THE  importance  of  the  attitude  of  William  Penn  towards 
the  Indian  natives  of  Pennsylvania  has  not  been  over 
estimated,  though  probably  the  emphasis  has  been  wrongly 
placed.  It  was  a  just  as  well  as  a  politic  thing  to  do,  to 
buy  their  lands,  and  the  great  Shackamaxon  Treaty,  in 
itself  only  a  symbol  of  decent  treatment,  has  been 
interpreted  as  covering  the  whole  transaction.  As  some 
times  understood,  this  meant  that  Penn  and  a  few  trusted 
friends  brought  together  the  Indian  chiefs,  and  at  one 
great  negotiation,  with  much  eloquence  and  many  ex 
pressions  of  fraternity,  received  the  right  to  occupy  the 
soil  of  the  whole  province.  It  was  not  at  all  the  first 
time  that  Indian  rights  to  the  land  had  been  bought. 
The  Dutch  and  Swedes  on  both  sides  of  the  Delaware 
river  had  done  it  long  before  Penn  had  any  claims  there, 
and  were  careful  not  to  settle  on  unpurchased  soil.  It 
had  been  done  in  New  England,  New  York,  and  Mary 
land  at  their  early  settlements.  The  neglect  to  do  it  had 
led  to  massacres  and  the  extermination  of  several  colonies 
in  the  south.  By  1682  it  had  been  recognised  by 
colonists  generally  as  wise  policy.  Moreover,  Penn  did 
not  buy  all  Pennsylvania  at  one  transaction,  or  any  con 
siderable  part  of  it.  He  had  at  first  no  use  for  any  but 
a  little  strip  along  the  Delaware,  and  this  was  bought  of 
various  tribes  at  different  times  by  separate  treaties. 
This  south-eastern  part  of  the  state  is  divided  into  strips 
by  several  "  creeks "  running  down  from  the  upland 
country  to  the  river.  Penn  would  buy  from  one  creek 

495 


496    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

to  another,  and  the  unit  of  measure  up  the  creek  was  a 
day's  walk,  in  his  time  about  twenty  miles,  though  vastly 
extended  later.  The  Shackamaxon  Treaty  is  only  one 
of  several  which  between  1681  and  1686  conveyed  to 
Penn  the  south-eastern  corner  of  the  state,  extending 
perhaps  forty  miles  inland  and  running  up  the  river  above 
the  site  of  the  present  Trenton.  These  treaties  were  not 
only  negotiations  for  sale  of  land,  but  also  leagues  of 
friendship  where,  amid  much  circumlocution  in  Indian 
fashion,  eternal  amity  and  mutual  good-will  were  promised, 
and  the  promises  sealed  with  wampum  belts. 

But  this  sort  of  thing  was  not  new  in  1682.  It  had 
been  done  many  times  before.  We  must  go  farther  to 
seek  the  significance  of  the  Quaker  relation  to  the 
Indians. 

In  some  colonies  the  Indians  were  made  drunk,  and  in 
this  state  signed  away  valuable  claims.  In  others  false 
maps  were  shown  them,  or  false  weights  deceived  them  in 
selling  their  furs.  The  land  unpurchased  was  not  always 
excluded  from  settlement.  They  were  killed,  and  no 
penalty  was  meted  out  to  the  white  murderer.  Their 
food  was  taken,  in  their  eyes  unjustly,  often  by  irre 
sponsible  whites,  but  the  acts  were  not  disowned  by 
the  authorities.  They  were  treated  as  inferior,  and  their 
pride  was  hurt.  The  land  bought  of  one  tribe  was  not 
bought  of  another  which  possibly  had,  or  thought  it  had, 
superior  claims.  Rumours  of  Indian  invasions  were 
excuses  for  bloody  attacks. 

From  all  these  things  the  Pennsylvania  Indians  were 
preserved.  Every  effort  was  made  to  keep  rum  from 
them.  Again  and  again  in  the  minutes  of  the  meetings 
we  find  this  urged.  William  Penn  refused  the  right  to 
trade  to  men  likely  to  abuse  the  privilege.  Every  trans 
action  was  fairly  explained,  and  in  case  of  conflicting  claims 
all  were  satisfied.  His  first  "  Great  Law  "  enacted  that 
juries  which  sat  on  Indian  cases  should  be  half  white  and 
half  red.  This  was  an  impracticable  scheme,  but  when 
given  up  other  fair  methods  were  substituted.  The  price 
paid  was  in  their  eyes  ample  and  the  "walks"  were 


CH.  vi          FRIENDS  AND  THE   INDIANS  497 

moderately  construed.  In  1688  it  was  reported  from 
two  sources  apparently  independent  that  500  warriors 
were  about  to  attack  the  settlement,  and  had  already 
commenced  depredations.  Caleb  Pusey,  a  member  of  the 
Council,  and  one  of  the  prominent  Friends  of  the  Colony, 
offered  to  investigate  the  rumour  in  person,  if  five  others 
were  appointed  by  the  Council  to  go  with  him  unarmed. 
They  went  through  the  woods  to  the  alleged  rendezvous, 
found  the  king  lying  quietly  on  his  bed,  with  only  women 
and  children  about  him.  He  had  some  small  claims  for 
money  not  yet  paid  for  land,  but  was  not  troubled  about 
it,  and  added  that  the  authors  of  the  report  "  ought  to  be 
burned  to  death." 

It  was  this  fair  and  frank  treatment  which  created  the 
fraternity  which  held  good  for  about  sixty  years.  No 
Quaker  family  in  this  time  suffered  from  the  Indians, 
except  in  matters  of  petty  pilfering,  which  were  rectified 
where  possible.  Thus  the  Haverford  settlers  sent  to  the 
Council  a  charge  against  the  Indians  "  for  the  rapine  and 
destruction  of  their  hogs."  But  the  Council  sent  for  the 
"  Kings,"  and  we  hear  no  more  of  it.  The  red  men  were 
welcome  guests  in  the  homes,  and  hospitably  entertained 
the  whites  in  their  wigwams.  They  supplied  them  with 
wild  food  abundantly,  and  were  paid  a  satisfactory  sum. 
"  As  our  worthy  proprietor  treated  the  Indians  with 
extraordinary  humanity  they  became  very  civil  and  loving 
to  us  and  brought  us  in  abundance  of  venison,"  said 
Richard  Townsend.  They  looked  after  white  children 
when  their  parents  went  away  to  meeting,  and  were  good 
neighbours  in  times  of  need.  They  were  lazy,  improvident, 
weak-willed,  but  faithful  to  their  agreements.  General 
W.  H.  Harrison  says  : 

"  A  long  and  intimate  knowledge  of  them  in  peace  and  war,  as 
enemies  and  friends,  has  left  upon  my  mind  the  most  favorable 
impression  of  their  character  for  bravery,  generosity  and  fidelity 
to  their  engagements." 

The  Moravian  missionary  Heckewelder  relates  a 
ceremony  which  he  had  often  seen,  when  the  old  men 

2  K 


498    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

spread  out  on  a  blanket  or  piece  of  bark  the  various 
wampum  belts  which  commemorated  the  treaties  of 
William  Penn,  and  explained  to  the  young  braves  the 
significance  of  each  and  the  sacred  obligations  attaching 
to  it.  This  custom  was  kept  up  for  100  years,  and  the 
contract  was  passed  on  from  father  to  son. 

The  Friends,  beginning  with  George  Fox  and  William 
Penn,  made  many  attempts  to  convert  the  Indians  to 
Christianity.  At  first  they  had  large  hopes  of  success. 
Their  favourite  teaching  of  the  universal  divine  light 
seemed  in  consonance  with  Indian  ideas.  When  spoken 
to  in  this  way  they  said  that  the  Good  Spirit  in  their 
hearts  confirmed  the  words.  But  this  was  about  as  far 
towards  Quakerism  as  they  ever  got.  Indian  converts 
were  practically  non-existent.  The  Moravians,  with  a 
definite  teaching  of  ordinances,  which  appealed  to  the 
pictorial  sense  of  the  woodmen,  were  more  successful,  and 
some  hundreds  of  them,  as  the  result  of  the  work  and 
influence  of  devoted  missionaries,  joined  the  peaceful  sect, 
only  to  suffer  later  the  horrible  massacre  of  Gnadenhiitten. 
The  Indians  respected  Quaker  teaching  and  example, 
but  did  not  adopt  them.  Had  it  been  possible  to  have 
kept  from  them  the  physical  and  moral  diseases  of  the 
whites  and  gradually  to  have  influenced  them  towards 
civilisation,  the  results  might  have  been  more  happy. 
But  the  slow  development  of  the  Seneca  Indians  in 
western  New  York  under  Quaker  tutelage  for  a  century 
shows  in  them  an  incapacity  to  accept  quickly  the  moral 
and  religious  ideals  of  their  teachers. 

William  Penn  had  more  influence  over  them  than  any 
other.  They  attended  his  conferences,  and  drank  his 
spirits,  which  he  handed  out  to  them  moderately,  with 
great  enthusiasm.  They  were  delighted  when  he  joined 
them  in  athletic  sports,  and  when  he  spoke  their  language. 
He  was  evidently  a  man  after  their  liking,  an  elder 
brother,  and  they  listened  with  becoming  gravity  to 
his  religious  exhortations.  Thomas  Turner,  Thomas 
Story,  John  Richardson,  and  Thomas  Chalkley  had 
devotional  meetings  with  them.  They  listened  sym- 


CH.  vi          FRIENDS  AND  THE   INDIANS  499 

pathetically  and   approvingly   but  went   their   own   way 
afterwards. 

The  corporate  "  concern "  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  is 
expressed  in  the  following  minutes : 

"1685.  This  Meeting  doth  unanimously  agree  and  give  as 
their  Judgment,  that  it  is  not  consistent  with  the  Honour  of 
Truth,  for  any  that  makes  Profession  thereof,  to  sell  Rum  or 
other  strong  Liquors  to  the  Indians,  because  they  use  them  not 
to  moderation,  but  to  Excess  and  Drunkeness. 

"  1687.  We  give  forth  this  as  our  Sense,  that  the  practice  of 
selling  Rum  or  other  strong  Liquors  to  the  Indians  directly  or 
indirectly,  or  exchanging  Rum,  or  other  strong  Liquors,  for  any 
Goods  or  merchandize  with  them,  considering  the  abuses  they 
make  of  it,  is  a  thing  contrary  to  the  mind  of  the  Lord,  and 
great  Grief  and  Burthen  to  his  people,  and  a  great  Reflection 
and  Dishonor  to  the  Truth,  so  far  as  any  professing  it  are 
concerned;  and  for  the  more  effectually  preventing  this  evil 
practice  as  aforesaid,  We  advise  that  this  our  Testimony  may 
be  entered  in  every  Monthly  Meeting  Book,  and  every  friend 
belonging  to  the  said  meeting  to  subscribe  the  same. 

"1719.  Advised,  that  such  be  dealt  with  as  sell,  barter,  or 
exchange  directly  or  indirectly,  to  the  Indians,  Rum,  Brandy,  or 
any  other  strong  Liquors,  it  being  contrary  to  the  Care  Friends 
always  had,  since  the  settlement  of  these  Countries,  that  they 
might  not  contribute  to  the  Abuse  and  Hurt  those  poor  people 
received  by  drinking  thereof,  being  generally  incapable  of  using 
Moderation  therein ;  and  to  avoid  giving  them  Occasion  of 
Discontent,  it  is  desired,  that  Friends  do  not  buy  or  sell 
Indian  Slaves. 

"1722.  When  way  was  made  for  our  worthy  Friends,  the 
Proprietors  and  Owners  of  Lands  in  these  provinces  to  make 
their  first  Settlements,  it  pleased  Almighty  God  by  his  over 
ruling  Providence  to  influence  the  native  Indians  so  as  to  make 
them  very  helpful  and  serviceable  to  those  early  Settlers,  before 
they  could  raise  Stocks,  or  Provisions  to  sustain  themselves  and 
families :  and  it  being  soon  observed,  that  those  people  when 
they  got  Rum,  or  other  strong  Liquors,  set  no  Bounds  to  them 
selves,  but  were  apt  to  be  abusive,  and  sometimes  destroyed  one 
another,  there  came  a  religious  Care  and  Concern  upon  Friends, 
both  in  their  Meetings  and  Legislature,  to  prevent  those  Abuses. 
Nevertheless,  some  people  prefering  their  filthy  lucre  before  the 
common  Good,  continued  in  this  evil  Practice,  so  that  our 
Yearly  Meeting  held  in  Philadelphia  in  the  year  1687,  testified, 
4  That  the  practice  of  selling  Rum,  or  other  strong  Liquors  to 


500    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

the  Indians  directly  or  indirectly,  or  exchanging  the  same  for 
any  Goods  or  Merchandize  with  them  (considering  the  abuse 
they  make  of  it)  is  a  thing  displeasing  to  the  Lord,  a  Dishonour 
to  Truth,  and  a  Grief  to  all  good  people.'  And  altho'  this 
Testimony  hath  been  since  renewed  by  several  Yearly  Meetings, 
it  is  yet  too  notorious,  that  the  same  hath  not  been  observed  by 
some  persons ;  and  therefore  it  is  become  the  weighty  Concern 
of  this  Meeting  earnestly  to  recommend  the  said  Testimony  to 
the  strict  Observance  of  all  Friends ;  and  where  any  under  our 
profession  shall  act  contrary  thereunto,  let  them  be  speedily 
dealt  with,  and  censured  for  such  their  evil  Practices. 

"  1759.  The  Empires  and  Kingdoms  of  the  Earth  are  subject 
to  the  Almighty  power,  he  is  the  God  of  the  Spirits  of  all  Flesh, 
and  deals  with  his  people,  agreeable  to  that  Wisdom,  the  Depth 
whereof  is  to  us  unsearchable ;  we  in  these  provinces  may  say, 
He  hath,  as  a  gracious  and  tender  parent,  dealt  bountifully  with 
us,  even  from  the  Days  of  our  Fathers;  it  was  he  who  strengthened 
them  to  labour  thro'  the  Difficulties  attending  the  Improvement 
of  a  Wilderness,  and  made  way  for  them  in  the  Hearts  of  the 
Natives,  so  that  by  them  they  were  comforted  in  times  of  Want 
and  Distress. 

"  It  was  by  the  gracious  influences  of  his  holy  Spirit,  that  they 
were  disposed  to  work  Righteousness  and  walk  uprightly  one 
towards  another  and  towards  the  Natives,  and  in  Life  and 
Conversation  to  manifest  the  Excellency  of  the  principles  and 
Doctrines  of  the  Christian  Religion,  and  thereby  they  retained 
their  Esteem  and  Friendship :  Whilst  they  were  laboring  for  the 
Necessaries  of  Life,  many  of  them  were  fervently  engaged  to 
promote  piety  and  virtue  in  the  Earth,  and  educate  their 
Children  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord. 

"1761.  It  being  observed  by  the  last  Epistle  from  the 
Meeting  for  Sufferings  in  London,  that  they  express  their 
approbation  of  the  proceedings  of  those  Friends  here,  who  have 
been  concerned  in  using  their  Endeavours  for  the  Establishment 
of  Peace  with  the  Indians,  by  pacific  Measures,  and  warmly 
recommend  that  a  Christian  Regard  and  Notice  may  be 
extended  towards  these  people,  for  cultivating  a  good  Under 
standing  with  them,  and  the  Confirmation  of  peace  on  the 
principles  of  Justice  and  Equity.  Several  suitable  Observations 
were  now  made  thereupon,  to  excite  friends  individually  to  a 
religious  Concern  and  Care  in  this  matter ;  now  especially,  as  of 
late,  some  good  Effects  of  a  remarkable  Visitation  of  divine 
Grace  has  appeared  among  some  of  those  people.  .  ." 

The  Assembly,  in  early  days  under  the  influence  of  the 


CH.  vi          FRIENDS  AND  THE  INDIANS  501 

same  men  that  led  the  meetings,  followed  the  meetings  a 
few  years  later  with  its  prohibitions  against  selling  liquor, 
its  votes  of  supplies  to  maintain  Indian  friendship  and  to 
purchase  land,  its  hospitable  treatment  of  visiting  chieftains 
and  its  formal  expression  of  eternal  brotherhood.  James 
Logan  was  in  charge  of  the  relations  with  the  red  men  for 
about  fifty  years  after  Penn's  second  visit  of  1701.  With 
skill  and  kindly  hospitality  and  accurate  knowledge  of 
Indian  character,  he  led  the  colony  along  the  paths  of 
peace.  He  could  not,  or  did  not,  however,  avert  the 
alienation  of  the  Delaware  tribe  caused  by  a  series  of 
outrages  upon  their  rights,  the  most  noted  of  which 
was  the  Walking  purchase  of  1737.  Friends  were  not 
even  remotely  responsible  for  this  inequity,  but  as  they 
had  to  aid  in  overcoming  its  unfortunate  results,  it  is 
proper  to  refer  to  it  here. 

There  was  an  old  agreement,  of  doubtful  authenticity, 
made  in  1686,  which  conveyed  to  William  Penn  certain 
land  in  Bucks  County  and  extending  northwards  as  far 
as  a  man  could  walk  in  a  day  and  a  half.  With  the 
understanding  of  the  time,  this  would  mean  about  thirty 
miles,  and  would  carry  the  purchase  to  the  junction  of  the 
Delaware  and  Lehigh  Rivers  where  Easton  stands.  But 
the  land  farther  to  the  north  between  the  rivers  was 
greatly  desired  by  Thomas  Penn,  the  son  and  heir  of  the 
founder,  and  then  potent  in  the  management  of  the 
executive  branch  of  the  government.  There  were 
settlers  who  would  buy  of  him,  and  some  had  already 
gone  there  and  occupied  their  tracts.  The  Minisink 
tribe  of  the  Delaware  Indians,  whose  ancestral  home  was 
there,  refused  to  sell,  and  asked  to  have  it  secured  from 
invasion.  No  one  questioned  their  right,  and  so  artifice 
had  to  be  resorted  to  to  give  an  appearance  of  legality  to 
the  claim.  The  "  Walk  "  would  be  taken.  Two  athletes 
were  found  and  trained.  The  underbrush  was  cleared, 
horses  provided  to  carry  the  impedimenta,  and  boats  to 
cross  the  streams.  The  runners  covered  sixty  miles,  and 
at  the  end  of  the  line  the  surveyors  slanted  the  upper 
boundary,  which  was  to  reach  the  Delaware  River,  far  to 


502    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

the  north  so  as  to  enclose  all  the  desired  territory.  The 
Indians  were  told  that  their  land  had  been  sold  and  were 
ordered  to  leave.  But,  conscious  of  the  fraud,  they  were 
sullen  and  disobedient,  and  the  Quaker  legislature  would 
appropriate  nothing  to  enforce  the  demand.  Thus 
matters  remained  till  1742,  when  another  power  was 
introduced. 

The  Delaware  Indians  were  at  this  time  subject  to  the 
over-lordship  of  the  Iroquois  of  New  York,  "  women,"  in 
the  language  of  the  forest.  A  great  convention  was  held 
in  Philadelphia,  attended  by  all  parties  interested.  After 
a  due  allowance  of  liquor  and  many  seductive  words  of 
friendship,  the  Iroquois  judicially  examined  the  old  deeds 
and  the  records  of  the  walk  and  pronounced  judgment 
against  the  Minisinks,  telling  them  that  they  had  no  right 
to  make  treaties  and  that  they  must  immediately  remove 
to  the  Susquehanna.  The  alliance  was  too  strong  to 
resist,  and  they,  with  bitter  hearts,  left  their  old  home  to 
the  whites. 

It  may  be  significant  that  while  many  of  the  Indian 
treaties  and  negotiations  were  held  in  the  Meeting-Houses 
of  Friends,  this  one  was  at  the  house  of  the  Proprietor. 
The  Minisinks  went  westward  and  bided  their  time. 

This  process  of  encroachment  on  what  seemed  to  the 
Indians  their  rights  now  went  on.  They  were  drugged 
with  liquor  and  cheated  ;  their  lands  were  appropriated  in 
advance  of  purchase.  Their  crowning  grievance  came  in 
1754,  when  at  Albany  the  proprietors  purchased  of  the 
Iroquois,  many  of  the  Pennsylvania  tribes  being  un 
represented,  nearly  the  whole  of  western  Pennsylvania. 
To  have  all  their  ground  sold  over  their  heads  and  the 
proceeds  go  to  their  feudal  lords  was  bad  enough,  but 
those  that  were  present  came  away  with  a  belief  that  they 
had  been  defrauded.  They  did  not  understand,  they  said, 
the  compass  courses  and  did  not  know  the  extent  of  the 
sale  ;  they  were  told  that  it  was  only  to  clear  away  some 
titles  which  Connecticut  claimed  ;  they  believed  that  some 
chiefs  were  privately  bought. 

The  French  ingeniously  fanned  the  flames,  and  when 


CH.  vi          FRIENDS  AND  THE   INDIANS  503 

Braddock  went  down  to  defeat  before  Fort  Du  Quesne  the 
next  year,  the  long  smouldering  wrath  of  the  Penn 
sylvania  Indians  found  vent,  and  for  the  first  time  the 
frontiers  were  wet  with  blood.  The  Governor  and  Council 
declared  war,  bounties  were  offered  for  scalps  of  the  male 
and  female  Indians,  and  the  Quaker  legislators  resigned. 

Here  was  work  cut  out  for  the  Friends.  They  formed 
"  The  Friendly  Association  for  gaining  and  preserving 
Peace  with  the  Indians  by  pacific  measures."  They  had 
been  charged  with  parsimony  in  their  objections  to  war 
appropriations  and  the  payment  of  war  taxes,  and  now 
agreed  to  give  "  a  much  larger  part  of  our  estates  than 
the  heaviest  taxes  of  a  war  can  be  expected  to  require." 
They  were  used  to  the  peaceable  method  of  settling 
Indian  affairs,  and  knew  that  it  cost  money.  In  times 
of  perfect  peace  the  records  seem  to  indicate  that 
some  .£500  a  year  had  been  expended  for  Indian 
presents  by  the  Assembly.  Whether  this  gratuitous  aid 
was  good  for  the  Indians  may  be  doubted.  The  best 
thing  for  them  would  have  been  never  to  have  seen  a 
paleface.  But  it  was  cheaper  and  better  both  for  white 
and  red  men  than  fighting.  Now  that  war  was  on,  and 
rewards  for  scalps  substituted  for  public  presents,  private 
liberality  was  to  make  the  attempt  to  win  back  the 
Indians  to  peace.  They  began  with  the  northern 
Delawares  under  their  great  chief  Tedyuscung,  a 
diplomatist  of  no  mean  order  when  sober,  and  a  reliable 
friend  of  the  Quakers.  The  first  conference  was  at 
Easton  in  1756.  Israel  Pemberton,  the  leader  of  the 
movement,  and  a  large  number  of  other  Friends  were 
present,  though  evidently  not  desired  by  the  Governor. 
The  Indian  was  very  plain.  "  This  very  ground  that  is 
under  me  (striking  it  with  his  foot)  was  my  land  and 
inheritance  and  is  taken  from  me  by  fraud."  He  could 
not  forget  the  "  Walking  Purchase "  and  the  enforced 
emigration.  All  sorts  of  compromising  suggestions  were 
thrown  in  his  way,  but  with  the  aid  of  Friends  he  kept  a 
clear  course.  Then  appeared  the  confidence  won  by 
seventy  years  of  fair  intercourse.  Israel  Pemberton  said  : 


504    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

"  The  name  of  a  Quaker  of  the  same  spirit  as  William  Penn 
still  is  in  the  highest  estimation  among  their  old  men,  and  there 
is  a  considerable  number  of  us  here  united  in  a  resolution  to 
endeavor  by  the  like  conduct  to  fix  the  same  good  impression  of 
all  of  us  in  the  minds  of  the  rising  generation." 

The  next  year  another  conference  was  held  at  Easton, 
which  Tedyuscung  refused  to  attend  unless  the  Friends 
were  there.  Then,  probably  at  their  instigation,  he  made 
the  demand  for  a  private  clerk  to  note  the  proceedings. 
This  he  also  made  an  ultimatum,  and  unwillingly  the 
Governor  yielded.  He  chose  Charles  Thomson,1  then  a 
young  man,  master  of  the  Friends  public  school,  after 
wards  secretary  of  the  Continental  Congress  and  author 
of  a  Translation  of  the  Bible. 

It  took  weeks  to  do  the  talking,  and  then  they 
adjourned  till  1758,  when  a  still  larger  number  of  Indians 
was  brought  in.  Tedyuscung  still  was  master  of  the 
situation,  and  the  eloquence  flowed  on.  He  finally  got 
some  kind  of  a  recognition  that  the  "  walk  "  was  unfair, 
was  given  compensation  for  his  stolen  lands,  and  a  peace 
was  declared,  cemented  by  the  Friendly  presents. 

The  Western  Indians  were  also  brought  into  peaceful 
lines.  The  Assembly  was  short  of  money,  and  though 
now  not  made  up  of  Friends  was  thoroughly  sympathetic. 
When  the  Association  offered  to  lend  them  money,  the 
House  accepted  the  loan  with  thanks  "  for  their  friendly 
and  generous  offer."  They  sent  some  £2000  of  goods 
to  Pittsburgh  for  the  Indians,  and  acted  as  agent  of  the 
British  government  in  forwarding  another  consignment 
for  the  same  purpose.  Peace  for  a  little  time  through 
their  efforts  settled  down  over  Pennsylvania.  It  was  a 
great  work  well  done,  costing  the  Association  about 
£5000. 

Few  deductions  of  historic  significance  are  more 
evident  than  that  the  Quaker  method  of  Indian  manage 
ment  if  continued  through  all  the  years  after  the  death  of 
William  Penn,  would  have  saved  the  Colony  from  all 

1  The  best  account  of  all  these  proceedings  is  in  a  book  written  by  Charles 
Thomson,  The  Alienation  of  the  Delaware  and  Shawnese  Indians, 


CH.VI          FRIENDS  AND  THE  INDIANS  505 

these  wars.  As  Charles  Thomson,  who  was  not  a  Friend 
and  not  opposed  to  all  war,  and  who  had  a  first-hand 
knowledge  of  the  whole  series  of  transaction,  has 
conclusively  shown,  the  Delawares  and  Shawnese  were 
thrown  into  the  arms  of  the  French  by  indefensible 
treatment.  Had  their  friendliness  been  retained  they 
would  have  been  an  effectual  buffer  against  western 
attack,  and  the  frontiers  might  have  remained  in  security. 
The  Friendly  policy  of  the  early  settlers  is  abundantly 
justified  on  the  score  of  justice,  peace  and  economy. 
Had  Thomas  Penn  had  the  spirit  of  his  father,  the  Holy 
Experiment  might  have  been  continued  as  a  more  potent 
"  example  to  the  nations,"  and  to  the  advantage  of  his 
finances.  Incidentally  also  the  active  Friendly  participa 
tion  in  Pennsylvania  politics,  and  the  attitude  of  the  Society 
to  public  life,  might  have  been  continued  at  least  to  the 
Revolutionary  War.  That  there  was  in  the  Indian  mind 
some  sense  of  justice  which  prevented  outrages  on 
regularly  purchased  land  is  evidenced  by  several  state 
ments,  as  for  instance  one  by  William  Reckitt,  an  English 
travelling  minister  of  1756,  who  says,  "  Friends  hitherto 
had  not  been  hurt,  yet  several  had  left  their  plantations 
and  fled  back  again  over  the  Blue  Mountains,  where  the 
lands  had  been  rightly  purchased  of  the  Indians." 

Scarcely  had  the  province  settled  down  into  peace, 
through  the  efforts  of  the  "  Friendly  Association  "  and  the 
final  defeat  of  the  French  and  the  surrender  of  Canada 
to  England,  when  another  cause  of  disturbance  arose 
which  shook  the  Yearly  Meeting  to  its  centre.  This  time 
the  opposition  was  not  the  Proprietors  and  Governor,  but 
the  Presbyterian  frontiersmen  on  the  Susquehanna  River, 
the  "  Paxton  Boys,"  as  the  records  of  the  time  usually  call 
them. 

In  the  fall  of  1763  John  Penn,  the  grandson  of  the 
Founder,  came  as  Governor.  Among  the  delegations 
which  welcomed  him  was  one  from  the  Conestoga  Indians 
of  Lancaster  County.  Their  tribe  had  made  treaties  with 
William  Penn,  had  been  permitted  to  live  on  one  of  his 
manors,  had  been  visited  by  Thomas  Chalkley  and  other 


506    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

Friends,  and  were  generally  regarded  as  a  harmless 
company  of  makers  of  baskets  and  brooms,  which  they 
sold  to  the  settlers.  But  white  diseases  and  vices  had 
carried  them  off,  and  now  only  about  twenty  remained, 
mostly  women  and  children. 

The  settlers  about  them  and  to  the  west  were  mostly 
Scotch- Irishmen,  a  militant  vigorous  people,  who  based 
their  morality  upon  the  Old  Testament,  and  felt  themselves 
commissioned  like  Joshua  to  destroy  the  people  of  the 
land.  They  were  just  now  irritated  by  sporadic  border 
outrages,  and  incensed  against  the  Quakers  for  befriending 
the  Indians  and  opposing  military  expenses.  They  had 
adopted  the  Indian  theory  that  in  a  time  of  war  all  of  the 
opposing  colour  might  properly  be  killed.  They  suspected, 
with  how  much  justice  it  is  difficult  to  determine,  that 
these  Conestoga  Indians  gave  information  to  their  more 
warlike  western  brethren,  and  resolved  to  annihilate  the 
tribe.  This  they  did,  some  in  their  homes,  and  the 
rest  in  the  Lancaster  jail  where  the  Indians  had  been 
placed  for  safety.  This  first  Pennsylvania  lynching 
created  great  indignation  in  the  east,  but  so  secure  were 
the  "  Boys  "  in  the  support  of  their  neighbours  that  they 
never  could  be  brought  to  justice. 

Encouraged  by  this  immunity,  they  announced  their 
intention  of  meting  out  a  like  fate  to  a  band  of  Moravian 
Indians  that  had  been  removed  for  safety  to  Philadelphia, 
and  intimated  that  the  Quakers  who  stood  in  their  way, 
especially  Israel  Pemberton,  might  be  treated  similarly. 
A  band  of  several  hundred  marched  in  rude  array  from 
the  Susquehanna,  and  encamped  at  Germantown.  The 
town  rose  to  arms  to  .  defend  the  Indians.  Many  young 
Friends  joined,  and  it  being  a  cold  winter  day  the  meeting 
house  served  as  barracks,  and  the  guns  were  stacked  in 
the  gallery. 

This  show  of  force  was  all  that  was  necessary.  The 
raiders  were  met  by  Benjamin  Franklin  at  the  head  of  a 
delegation,  which  asked  their  grievances  and  promised  a 
careful  consideration.  There  was  some  justice  to  their 
claim  for  increased  representation  if  this  were  to  be  based 


CH.VI          FRIENDS  AND  THE   INDIANS  507 

on  numbers,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  only  demand 
which  was  granted  them  by  Governor  John  Penn  and 
his  council  was  a  reward  for  Indian  scalps,  which  was 
intended  to  stimulate  the  industry  of  the  frontiersmen  in 
this  direction. 

The  meeting,  however,  had  the  problem  on  its  hands 
of  dealing  with  its  members  whose  conduct  had  helped 
to  frustrate  the  intentions  of  the  attacking  party.  The 
proceedings  in  Philadelphia  Monthly  Meeting  were  carried 
over  several  years.  Those  who  acknowledged  an  offence 
were  very  few.  The  others  justified  themselves.  No  one 
was  disowned.  There  must  have  been  a  secret  sympathy 
with  the  young  men  which  prevented  anything  more  decided 
than  "labour"  to  induce  them  to  see  the  logic  of  the 
Friendly  position  against  war.  Many  of  these  offenders 
became  a  dozen  years  later  active  participants  in 
American  defence,  and  lost  their  rights  among  Friends 
as  a  consequence.  Others  changed  their  views,  and  were 
strong  advocates  of  the  Yearly  Meeting's  position,  and 
suffered  for  it.  James  Logan  favoured  defensive  war 
during  his  older  years,  and  the  Quakers,  of  whom 
Benjamin  Franklin  in  his  autobiography  writes  as  actively 
sympathetic  with  military  measures,  were  of  this  same 
period.  But  they  never  represented  the  official  attitude 
of  the  Yearly  Meeting.  The  Pontiac  Wars  immediately 
followed  this  episode,  and  gave  the  Friendly  Association 
plenty  to  do,  though  it  probably  disbanded  soon  after. 

In  1768  the  treaty  of  Fort  Stanwix  quieted  the  Indian 
Question  for  colonial  days. 

An  active  and  virulent  pamphlet  warfare  followed  the 
Paxton  Invasion,  the  combatants  being  Presbyterians  on 
one  side  and  the  defenders  of  Friends  on  the  other.  It 
is  said  that  none  of  the  publications,  except  a  paper  issued 
by  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings,  was  the  work  of  Friends 
themselves.  The  controversy  was  not  mild.  The  line  of 
attack  was  that  non-military  advocacy  was  an  impossible 
element  in  a  government  with  outside  enemies  ;  that  the 
best  and  most  practical  Friends  did  not  believe  in  it ;  and 
that  the  others  had  no  business  in  state  affairs,  and  were 


508    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  v 

beginning  to  come  to  this  conclusion  themselves.  To 
this  it  was  replied  that  for  seventy  years  the  policy  had 
succeeded  until  muddled  by  alien  elements,  out  of  line 
with  it,  and  which  could  not  be  controlled  ;  that  it  was 
the  encroachments  and  excesses  of  the  Scotch-Irishmen, 
rather  than  the  lack  of  military  defence,  which  were  the 
initial  cause  of  the  troubles,  and  that  treaties  and  presents 
and  friendship  rather  than  killing  and  fighting  were  still 
the  means  by  which  peace  could  best  be  regained. 

With  many  unjustifiable  reflections  on  either  side, 
which  may  here  be  omitted,  this  question  of  the  adapta 
bility  of  Quakerism  to  government  was  ably  debated,  and 
when  a  temperate  official  document  came  out  restating  the 
ancient  arguments  against  war,  and  giving  a  short  re'sume' 
of  the  history  of  Friends  connected  with  government  in 
the  past,  the  controversy  closed,  not,  however,  without 
leaving  many  bitter  personal  and  partisan  feelings. 


CHAPTER    VII 

FRIENDS    AND    SLAVERY 

THAT  Friends  have  been  in  point  of  time  leaders  in  many 
moral  reforms  can  not  well  be  gainsaid.  Why  they  have 
been  so  is  more  difficult  to  tell.  They  have  not  been 
superior  in  intelligence  or  education  to  many  other 
Christian  bodies.  They  probably  have  not  had  more  of 
devotion  to  goodness,  or  a  greater  desire  to  do  right  than 
many  others.  They  have  not  been  in  positions  where 
they  could  see  in  advance  the  trend  of  human  thought  or 
impulse  better  than  others.  Is  there  any  reason  more 
probable  than  the  one  the  early  Friends  themselves  would 
have  given,  that  when  they  got  together  in  their  quiet 
assemblies,  each  one  seeking  to  know  God's  will,  with 
hearts  prepared  to  follow  it,  and  minds  emptied  so  far  as 
possible  of  misleading  prepossessions  and  prejudices,  they 
received  the  instruction  for  which  they  waited  ?  They 
rather  felt  than  reasoned  that  some  things  were  right  and 
others  were  wrong,  and  that  it  was  their  duty  to  follow 
the  right  in  the  face  of  apparent  difficulties  and  danger. 
It  was  not  a  question  of  results.  They  were  not 
opportunists,  nor  did  they  parley  with  their  fears.  The 
simple  revelation  came  to  them  that  they  should  follow  a 
certain  course  in  the  definite  issue  before  them,  and  in 
time  it  became  evident  that  this  was  the  course  the  future 
would  sanction.  This  did  not  preclude  the  exercise  of 
reason  and  common  sense.  It  simply  permitted  this  sense 
of  right  to  turn  the  scale  in  the  midst  of  conflicting 
arguments  on  both  sides. 

There  were  in  colonial  times  in  Pennsylvania  several 

509 


5io    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

moral  questions  affecting  politics  which  have  been  already 
considered,  as  oaths,  penalties  for  crime,  the  amount  of 
force  to  be  used  in  supporting  law,  the  treatment  of  Indians, 
and  war.  On  these  subjects  it  will  generally  be  admitted 
that  Friends,  earlier  than  other  religious  bodies,  were  on 
the  right  side.  But  the  impulse  which  placed  them  there 
did  not  have  its  origin  in  politics,  but  in  the  church 
meetings.  We  find  the  minute  of  the  Yearly  Meeting 
used  as  the  preamble  to  a  statute  a  few  years  later.  Such 
a  relation  could  not  fail  to  exist  so  long  as  the  same  men 
were  prominent  in  both  sets  of  activities.  The  lessons 
learned  in  the  meeting  would  inevitably  crop  out  in  the 
Assembly. 

In  no  other  instance  is  this  growth  of  sentiment  for  a 
moral  cause  more  conspicuous  than  in  the  question  of 
slavery.  It  began  as  a  meeting  problem — a  problem  of 
individual  and  church  duty.  Following  this  by  a  few 
years  it  came  into  political  life,  and  as  the  meeting  cleared 
the  air  the  legislature  acted.  Very  soon  after  the  Yearly 
Meeting  had  abolished  slavery  among  its  members,  the 
state  of  Pennsylvania  enacted  an  abolition  law. 

We  will  trace  the  growth  of  the  movement  by  means 
of  the  meeting  records  of  the  colonial  days.  George  Fox 
in  a  public  discourse  in  1671  on  the  island  of  Barbadoes 
thus  advises  the  slave  holders  : l 

"  Let  me  tell  you  it  will  doubtless  be  very  acceptable  to  the 
Lord,  if  so  be  that  masters  of  families  here  would  deal  so  with 
their  servants,  the  negroes  and  blacks  whom  they  have  bought 
with  their  money  (as)  to  let  them  go  free  after  they  have  served 
faithfully  a  considerable  term  of  years,  be  it  thirty  years  after, 
more  or  less,  and  when  they  go  and  are  made  free,  let  them  not 
go  away  empty  handed." 

William  Penn  owned  a  few  slaves  in  Pennsylvania. 
When  he  left  in  1701  he  wrote  a  will  which  says,  "  I  give 
to  my  blacks  their  freedom  as  is  under  my  hand  already." 

1  For  the  most  of  the  quotations  in  this  chapter  the  author  is  indebted  to  a 
pamphlet  published  by  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting  in  1 843  entitled  ' '  A  Brief 
Statement  of  the  Rise  and  Progress  of  the  Testimony  of  the  Religious  Society  of 
Friends  against  Slavery  and  the  Slave  Trade." 


CH.  vii  FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY  511 

He  appears  to  have  intended  immediate  emancipation, 
but  his  wishes  in  this  respect  seem  not  to  have  been 
immediately  carried  out  after  he  left  the  province.  He 
was,  as  already  stated,  deeply  interested  in  a  proper 
education  and  religion  for  the  blacks. 

The  first  protest  after  the  German  memorial  of  1688, 
and  it  was  a  radical  one,  came  from  the  Keithians.  Their 
body  in  1693  declared  that  slavery  was  opposed  to  the 
Golden  Rule,  and  that  buying  negroes  was  buying  stolen 
goods  ;  that  "  to  buy  souls  and  bodies  of  men  for  money, 
to  enslave  them  and  their  posterity  to  the  end  of  the 
world,  we  judge  is  a  great  hindrance  to  the  spreading  of 
the  Gospel."  They  advise  that  no  negroes  be  bought, 
except  to  free  them,  and  none  be  held  in  slavery  after 
reasonably  working  out  any  charges  which  the  masters 
had  incurred  for  them. 

The  first  official  statement  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  on 
the  subject,  after  the  non-action  on  the  German  suggestion 
of  1688,  was  in  1696  when  the  Yearly  Meeting  advised  : 

"Whereas,  several  papers  have  been  read  relating  to  the 
keeping  and  bringing  in  of  negroes ;  which  being  duly  considered, 
it  is  the  advice  of  this  meeting  that  Friends  be  careful  not  to 
encourage  the  bringing  in  of  any  more  negroes ;  and  that  such 
that  have  negroes  be  careful  of  them,  bring  them  to  meetings, 
have  meetings  with  them  in  their  families,  and  restrain  them  from 
loose  and  lewd  living  as  much  as  in  them  lies,  and  from  rambling 
abroad  on  First-days  or  other  times." 

This  was  as  far  as  the  meeting  would  go.  Slave  Trade 
was  an  evil  and  must  be  discouraged,  and  such  blacks  as 
were  here  must  be  protected  and  trained  as  men. 

The  legislature  followed  slowly.  In  1700,  though 
almost  unanimously  Friendly,  they  rejected  a  bill  proposed 
by  William  Penn  "for  regulating  negroes  in  their  morals 
and  manners."  Five  years  later  they  made  certain  crimes 
capital  for  blacks  which  were  not  for  whites,  but  the  same 
year  they  taxed  the  owners  of  imported  negroes  forty 
shillings  per  head. 

The  radical  leaders  of  the  reform  seem  to  have  resided 
about  Chester.  This  meeting  in  1711  sent  up  a  minute 


512    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

to  the  Yearly  Meeting  expressing  its  dissatisfaction  with 
the  encouragement  the  slave  trade  received  by  the  purchase 
of  slaves  after  importation.  This  brought  out  the  moderate 
advice  that — 

"...  after  a  due  consideration  of  the  matter,  the  meeting 
considering  that  Friends  in  many  other  places  are  concerned 
in  it  as  much  as  we  are,  advises  that  Friends  may  be  careful, 
according  to  a  former  minute  of  this  Yearly  Meeting  (1696),  not 
to  encourage  the  bringing  in  of  any  more ;  and  that  all  merchants 
and  factors  write  to  their  correspondents  to  discourage  them  from 
sending  any  more." 

In  1712  William  Southeby,  a  Friend,  prayed  the 
legislature  to  abolish  slavery  in  Pennsylvania.  He  was  a 
pioneer.  The  House  would  not  do  this,  but  levied  a 
prohibitory  duty  of  £20  on  every  slave  imported,  which 
law  was  repealed  by  the  English  Queen. 

The  Yearly  Meeting  in  the  same  year  addressed  their 
Friends  in  London,  as  the  central  body  with  which  all  the 
others  corresponded,  asking  for  some  general  advice 
concerning  the  slave  trade  in  all  the  American  Colonies  : 

"  And  now  dear  Friends  we  impart  unto  you  a  concern  that 
hath  rested  on  our  minds  for  many  years,  touching  the  importing 
and  having  negro  slaves,  and  detaining  them  and  their  posterity 
as  such,  without  any  limitation  or  time  of  redemption  from  that 
condition.  This  matter  was  laid  before  this  meeting  many  years 
ago,  and  the  thing  in  some  degree  discouraged,  as  may  appear 
by  a  minute  of  our  Yearly  Meeting  (1696),  desiring  all  merchants 
and  traders  professing  Truth  among  us,  to  write  to  their 
correspondents,  that  they  send  no  more  negroes  to  be  disposed 
of  as  above;  yet  notwithstanding,  as  our  settlements  increased 
so  other  traders  flocked  in  amongst  us,  over  whom  we  had  no 
gospel  authority,  and  such  have  increased  and  multiplied  negroes 
amongst  us,  to  the  grief  of  divers  Friends,  whom  we  are  willing 
to  ease,  if  the  way  might  open  clear  to  the  satisfaction  of  the 
general ;  and  it  being  last  Yearly  Meeting  again  moved,  and 
Friends  being  more  concerned  with  negroes  in  divers  other 
provinces  and  places  than  in  these,  we  thought  it  too  weighty 
to  come  to  a  full  conclusion  therein ;  this  meeting  therefore 
desires  your  assistance  by  way  of  counsel  and  advice  therein, 
and  that  you  would  be  pleased  to  take  the  matter  into  your 
weighty  consideration,  after  having  advised  with  Friends  in  the 


CH.VH  FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY  513 

other  American  provinces,  and  give  us   your  sense  or  advice 
therein." 

The  suggestion  in  reply  to  this  was  very  cautious  and 
unsatisfactory,  and  in  1714,  rather  brusquely  for  a  Friendly 
Yearly  Meeting,  Philadelphia  writes  : — 

"  We  also  kindly  received  your  advice  about  negro  slaves,  and 
we  are  one  with  you  that  the  multiplying  of  them  may  be  of 
dangerous  consequence,  and  therefore  a  law  was  made  in 
Pennsylvania,  laying  a  duty  of  twenty  pounds  upon  every  one 
imported  there,  which  law  the  Queen  was  pleased  to  disannul. 
We  could  heartily  wish  that  a  way  might  be  found  to  stop  the 
bringing  in  more  here ;  or  at  least,  that  Friends  may  be  less 
concerned  in  buying  or  selling  of  any  that  may  be  brought  in ; 
and  hope  for  your  assistance  with  the  government,  if  any  further 
law  should  be  made,  discouraging  the  importation.  We  know 
not  of  any  Friend  amongst  us  that  has  any  hand  or  concern  in 
bringing  any  out  of  their  own  country ;  and  we  are  of  the  same 
mind  with  you,  that  the  practice  is  not  commendable  nor  allowable 
amongst  Friends;  and  we  take  the  freedom  to  acquaint  you, 
that  our  request  unto  you  was,  that  you  would  be  pleased  to 
consult  or  advise  with  Friends  in  other  plantations,  where  they 
are  more  numerous  than  with  us ;  because  they  hold  a  corre 
spondence  with  you  but  not  with  us,  and  your  meeting  may 
better  prevail  with  them,  and  your  advice  prove  more  effectual." 

The  next  year  Chester  Friends  again  stir  up  the  matter. 
They  send  a  very  urgent  request  to  legislate  that  "  Friends 
be  not  concerned  in  the  importing  and  bringing  of  negro 
slaves  in  the  future."  A  little  was  gained,  for  the  Yearly 
Meeting  decrees  : 

"  If  any  Friends  are  concerned  in  the  importation  of  negroes, 
let  them  be  dealt  with  and  advised  to  avoid  that  practice, 
according  to  the  sense  of  former  meetings  in  that  behalf;  and 
that  all  Friends  who  have  or  keep  negroes,  do  use  and  treat  them 
with  humanity  and  with  a  Christian  spirit ;  and  that  all  do 
forbear  judging  or  reflecting  on  one  another,  either  in  public  or 
private,  concerning  the  detaining  or  keeping  them  servants." 

But  Chester  was  not  satisfied,  and  again  petitioned  the 
Yearly  Meeting  in  1716  against  "  buying  any  that  shall 
be  imported  hereafter."  They  received  a  discouraging 
reply  which  indicated  that  no  forward  movement  was  to 
be  expected  at  that  time  : — 

2  L 


514    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

"As  to  the  proposal  from  Chester  meeting  about  negroes, 
there  being  no  more  in  it  than  was  proposed  to  the  last  Yearly 
Meeting,  this  meeting  cannot  see  any  better  conclusion,  than 
what  was  the  judgment  of  the  last  meeting,  and  therefore  do 
confirm  the  same ;  and  yet  in  condescension  to  such  Friends  as 
are  straitened  in  their  minds  against  the  holding  them,  it  is 
desired,  that  Friends  generally  do,  as  much  as  may  be,  avoid 
buying  such  negroes  as  shall  hereafter  be  brought  in,  rather  than 
offend  any  Friends  who  are  against  it ;  yet  this  is  only  caution 
and  not  censure." 

Three  years  later  they  advise  : 

"That  none  among  us  be  concerned  in  the  fetching  or 
importing  negro  slaves  from  their  own  country  or  elsewhere ;  and 
that  all  Friends  who  have  any  of  them  do  treat  them  with 
humanity  and  in  a  Christian  manner,  and  as  much  as  in  them 
lies  make  them  acquainted  with  the  principles  of  Friends,  and 
inculcate  morality  in  them." 

And  the  same  year  they  adopt  this  minute  showing 
that  Indians  as  well  as  negroes  were  held  in  slavery  by 
some  Friends  : 

"To  avoid  giving  them  [the  Indians]  occasion  of  discontent 
it  is  advised  that  Friends  do  not  buy  or  sell  Indian  slaves." 

Friends  had  done  all  they  could  directly  against  the 
slave  trade  from  Africa.  They  had  withdrawn  their 
members  from  participation,  and  had  secured  laws  from 
the  legislature  which  would  have  stopped  others  had  not 
the  Crown  disallowed  them.  There  came  a  lull  till  1729, 
when  Chester  again  appears  on  the  scene,  renewing  its  old 
request,  which  evidently  struck  at  the  root  of  the  trade, 
that  all  purchases  of  such  as  were  to  be  imported  should 
be  disallowed.  There  was  evidently  a  growth  in  public 
sentiment  in  the  intervening  ten  years.  The  minute  of 
1730  which  followed  means  more  than  appears  on  the 
surface.  The  reference  to  the  Monthly  Meetings  makes 
such  a  purchase  a  disownable  offence  : 

"  The  Friends  of  this  meeting  resuming  the  consideration  of 
the  proposition  of  Chester  meeting,  relating  to  the  purchasing  of 
such  negroes  as  may  hereafter  be  imported  ;  and  having  reviewed 


CH.  vii  FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY  515 

and  considered  the  former  minutes  relating  thereto,  and  having 
maturely  deliberated  thereon,  are  now  of  opinion,  that  Friends 
ought  to  be  very  cautious  of  making  any  such  purchases  for  the 
future,  it  being  disagreeable  to  the  sense  of  this  meeting.  And 
this  meeting  recommends  it  to  the  care  of  the  several  Monthly 
Meetings,  to  see  that  such  who  may  be,  or  are  likely  to  be  found 
in  that  practice,  may  be  admonished  and  cautioned  how  they 
offend  herein." 

Reports  were  now  sent  up  yearly  as  to  the  faithfulness 
with  which  the  instructions  were  carried  out.  In  1738 
the  Yearly  Meeting  says  : 

"  Divers  Friends  in  this  meeting  expressed  their  satisfaction  in 
finding  by  the  reports  of  the  quarterly  meetings,  that  there  is 
so  little  occasion  of  offence  given  by  Friends  concerning  the 
encouraging  the  importing  of  negroes ;  and  this  meeting  desires 
the  care  of  Friends  in  their  quarterly  and  monthly  meetings,  in 
this  particular,  may  be  continued." 

This  advice  was  crystallized  in  1743  into  the  following 
query  to  be  answered  annually  by  all  meetings :  "  Do 
Friends  observe  the  former  advice  of  our  Yearly  Meeting 
not  to  encourage  the  importation  of  negroes  nor  to  buy 
them  after  imported  ?  "  In  1755  this  was  enlarged  to  : 

"  Are  Friends  clear  of  importing  or  buying  negroes ;  and  do 
they  use  those  well  which  they  are  possessed  of  by  inheritance 
or  otherwise ;  endeavoring  to  train  them  up  in  the  principles 
of  the  Christian  religion  ?  " 

In  such  an  agitation  the  question  of  the  wrongfulness 
of  slavery  itself  could  not  fail  to  be  considered.  Men  were 
asking  whether  the  importation  was  the  only  evil.  John 
Woolman  and  Anthony  Benezet  were  beginning  to  write 
and  speak  for  the  blacks.  The  former  in  1754  published 
his,  Considerations  on  the  Keeping  of  Negroes,  which  was 
widely  read. 

The  same  year  the  Yearly  Meeting  issued  a  paper 
written  presumably  by  Anthony  Benezet.  It  attacked 
slavery  as  the  cause  of  the  slave  trade  with  its  attendant 
horrors,  and  argued  that  if  any  held  their  slaves  for  any 
other  reason  than  the  good  of  the  slaves  themselves,  it 
indicated  that  the  love  of  God  did  not  rule  their  lives. 


5i6    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

Slaves  seem  to  have  increased  in  number  among 
Friends,  and  probably  some  of  them  were  concerned  in 
the  trade,  for  in  1755  the  Yearly  Meeting  adopted  these 
directions  to  the  Monthly  Meetings  : 

"The  consideration  of  the  inconsistency  of  the  practice  of  being 
concerned  in  importing  or  buying  slaves,  with  our  Christian 
principles,  being  weightily  revived  and  impressed,  by  very 
suitable  advices  and  cautions  given  on  the  occasion,  it  is  the 
sense  and  judgment  of  this  meeting,  that  where  any  transgress 
this  rule  of  our  discipline,  the  overseers  ought  speedily  to  inform 
the  monthly  meeting  of  such  transgressors,  in  order  that  the 
meeting  may  proceed  to  treat  further  with  them,  as  they  may  be 
directed  in  the  wisdom  of  Truth." 

The  year  1758  was  the  great  year  in  the  history  of 
the  movement.  All  this  time  the  sentiment  against 
slavery  itself  had  been  gaining  ground.  The  Friends, 
doubtless,  had  treated  their  slaves  with  great  humanity, 
and  some  of  them  argued  with  truth  that  they  were 
undoubtedly  better  off  than  with  irresponsible  freedom. 
But  the  Quaker  conscience  could  not  be  lulled  with  this 
argument.  Slavery  was  wrong,  and  against  this  position 
there  could  be  no  effective  attack.  Ralph  Sandiford, 
John  Woolman,  Anthony  Benezet,  and  even  the  eccentric 
and  troublesome  Benjamin  Lay  were  preaching  it  to  an 
ever-increasing  circle  of  sympathetic  hearers.  It  was  not 
wrong  only  because  it  encouraged  the  trade — that  would 
now  be  admitted  by  all  Friends  ;  it  was  wrong  in  itself. 
No  man  had  a  right  to  hold  another  man  in  bondage  except 
temporarily  for  his  own  good. 

But  this  struck  at  many  personal  and  property 
interests,  and  these  joined  together  to  have  the  usual 
minute,  so  often  previously  adopted,  condemning  the 
African  importations  and  encouraging  the  good  treatment 
of  such  as  already  were  here,  again  sent  down  to  the 
meetings.  These  interested  advocates  of  a  deeply  rooted 
custom  for  a  time  swayed  the  Meeting.  But  the  fire 
burned  in  the  heart  of  John  Woolman.  He  felt  rather 
than  saw  the  sophistries  of  their  arguments.  He  could 
no  longer  be  silent.  It  had  been  urged  that  if  slavery 


CH.  vii  FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY  517 

was  wrong  God  Himself  would  open  a  way  to  abolish  it, 
and  that  unity  and  deference  were  Christian  duties. 
Then  he  spoke  : 

"  My  mind  is  led  to  consider  the  purity  of  the  Divine  Being 
and  the  justice  of  His  judgment,  and  herein  my  soul  is  covered 
with  awfulness.  I  cannot  forbear  to  hint  of  some  cases  where 
people  have  not  been  treated  with  the  purity  of  justice  and  the 
event  has  been  most  lamentable.  Many  slaves  on  this  continent 
are  oppressed  and  their  cries  have  entered  into  the  ears  of  the 
Most  High.  Such  are  the  purity  and  certainty  of  His  judgments 
that  He  cannot  be  partial  in  our  favour.  In  infinite  love  and 
goodness  He  hath  opened  our  understandings  from  one  time  to 
another  concerning  our  duty  towards  this  people ;  and  it  is  not 
a  time  for  delay.  Should  we  now  be  sensible  of  what  He 
requires  of  us,  and  through  a  respect  to  the  private  interests  of 
some  persons,  or  through  a  regard  to  some  friendships  which  do 
not  stand  upon  an  immutable  foundation,  neglect  to  do  our  duty 
in  firmness  and  constancy,  still  waiting  for  some  extraordinary 
means  to  bring  about  their  deliverance,  God  may  by  terrible 
things  in  righteousness  answer  us  in  this  matter." 

To  this  feeling  appeal  of  John  Woolman  the  Meeting 
responded.  There  was  an  authority  in  it  which  quieted 
opposition,  and  without  spoken  dissent  the  following 
minute  was  adopted : 

"  After  weighty  consideration  of  the  circumstances  of  Friends 
within  the  compass  of  this  meeting,  who  have  any  negro  or 
other  slaves,  the  accounts  and  proposals  now  sent  up  from 
several  quarters,  and  the  rules  of  our  discipline  relative  thereto ; 
much  time  having  been  spent,  and  the  sentiments  of  many 
Friends  expressed,  there  appears  an  unanimous  concern  prevail 
ing  to  put  a  stop  to  the  increase  of  the  practice  of  importing, 
buying,  selling,  or  keeping  slaves  for  term  of  life ;  or  purchasing 
them  for  such  a  number  of  years,  as  manifests  that  such 
purchasers  do  only  in  terms,  and  not  in  fact,  avoid  the  imputa 
tion  of  being  keepers  of  slaves.  This  meeting  very  earnestly 
and  affectionately  intreats  Friends,  individually,  to  consider 
seriously  the  present  circumstances  of  these  and  the  adjacent 
provinces,  which,  by  the  permission  of  Divine  Providence,  have 
been  visited  with  the  desolating  calamities  of  war  and  bloodshed, 
so  that  many  of  our  fellow-subjects  are  now  suffering  in  captivity ; 
and  fervently  desires,  that,  excluding  temporal  considerations  or 
views  of  self-interest,  we  may  manifest  an  humbling  sense  of 


5i8    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

these  judgments,  and  in  thankfulness  for  the  peculiar  favour 
extended  and  continued  to  our  Friends  and  brethren  in  pro 
fession,  none  of  whom  have,  as  we  have  yet  heard,  been  slain 
nor  carried  into  captivity,  would  steadily  observe  the  injunction 
of  our  Lord  and  Master,  'To  do  unto  others  as  we  would  they 
should  do  unto  us ' ;  which  it  now  appears  to  this  meeting, 
would  induce  such  Friends  who  have  any  slaves  to  set  them  at 
liberty, — making  a  Christian  provision  for  them  according  to 
their  ages,  etc.  And  in  order  that  Friends  may  be  generally 
excited  to  the  practice  of  this  advice,  some  Friends  here  now  signi 
fied  to  the  meeting  their  being  so  fully  devoted  to  endeavor  to 
render  it  effectual,  that  they  are  willing  to  visit  and  treat  with 
all  such  Friends  who  have  any  slaves;  the  meeting  therefore 
approves  of  John  Woolman,  John  Scarborough,  John  Sykes  and 
Daniel  Stanton  undertaking  that  service;  and  desires  some 
elders  or  other  faithful  Friends  in  each  quarter  to  accompany 
and  assist  them  therein ;  and  that  they  may  proceed  in  the 
wisdom  of  Truth,  and  thereby  be  qualified  to  administer  such 
advice  as  may  be  suitable  to  the  circumstances  of  those  they 
visit,  and  most  effectual  towards  obtaining  that  purity  which 
it  is  evidently  our  duty  to  press  after.  And  if  after  the  sense 
and  judgment  of  this  meeting,  now  given  against  every  branch 
of  this  practice,  any  professing  with  us  should  persist  to  vindicate 
it,  and  be  concerned  in  importing,  selling,  or  purchasing  slaves, 
the  respective  monthly  meetings  to  which  they  belong  should 
manifest  their  disunion  with  such  persons,  by  refusing  to 
permit  them  to  sit  in  meetings  for  discipline,  or  to  be  employed 
in  the  affairs  of  Truth,  or  to  receive  from  them  any  contribution 
towards  the  relief  of  the  poor,  or  other  services  of  the  meeting. 
But  if  any  cases  of  executors,  guardians,  trustees,  or  any  others 
should  happen,  which  may  subject  any  such  Friends  to  the 
necessity  of  being  concerned  with  such  slaves,  and  they  are 
nevertheless  willing  to  proceed  according  to  the  advice  of  the 
monthly  meetings  they  belong  to,  wherever  such  cases  happen, 
the  monthly  meetings  are  left  to  judge  of  the  same  in  the 
wisdom  of  Truth,  and,  if  necessary,  to  take  the  advice  of  the 
quarterly  meeting  therein." 

This  meeting  of  1758  was  a  memorable  one.  Two 
years  before,  partly  in  response  to  a  request  of  the  London 
Meeting  for  Sufferings,  the  majority  of  the  Friendly 
members  of  the  legislature  had  given  up  their  places 
rather  than  vote  supplies  to  the  war  against  the  Delaware 
and  Shawnee  Indians  which  the  Governor  had  declared. 


CH.  vii  FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY  519 

Now  the  Yearly  Meeting  sent  out  definite  advices  to  the 
Monthly  Meetings  not  to  permit  any  of  their  members  to 
hold  any  civil  offices  which  involved  any  departure  from 
Friendly  principles.  This  would,  for  a  time  at  least,  keep 
them  out  of  the  Assembly,  as  well  as  all  judicial  positions 
which  involved  administering  oaths.  With  this  with 
drawal  from  public  life  came  the  increased  zeal  for  moral 
causes.  The  transition  was  in  progress.  Friends  were 
no  longer  to  be  in  the  public  eye  in  matters  of  government, 
but  they  were  resolved  to  clear  themselves  of  moral 
taints  and  give  their  energies  to  the  machinery  of  moral 
reforms.  The  transformation  was  just  beginning  and  the 
Revolutionary  War  twenty  years  later  completed  it. 

The  purport  of  the  minute  was  that  slavery  as  an 
institution  was  to  be  testified  against,  and  all  the  persuasive 
influence  of  the  strong  men  of  the  Meeting  was  to  be  used 
with  slave-holders  to  induce  them  to  free  their  slaves. 
The  crusade  had  begun.  The  Yearly  Meeting  was  com 
mitted  and  all  loyal  members  were  expected  to  respect 
its  judgment.  John  Woolman  and  his  associates  travelled 
industriously,  and  laboured  in  the  meetings  and  at  the 
homes  assiduously.  There  is  but  little  record  of  the 
number  of  slaves  manumitted  in  the  succeeding  decade, 
but  there  were  many. 

In  1760,  after  only  two  years'  service,  the  Meeting 
minuted  : 

"  As  the  growing  concern  which  hath  appeared  amongst  us 
for  some  years  past  to  discourage  the  practice  of  making  slaves 
of  our  fellow-creatures  hath  been  visibly  blessed  with  success,  we 
earnestly  exhort  that  Friends  do  not  abate  their  diligence  in  this 
weighty  matter,  but  continue  in  the  love  which  beareth  long  and 
is  kind  to  labor  with  such  as  having  membership  with  us  do  in 
any  manner  by  buying,  selling,  or  keeping  them  countenance 
the  trade,  to  inform  their  understandings  and  convince  their 
judgments,  and  some  of  us  are  firmly  persuaded,  that  if  this  case 
is  diligently  and  honestly  pursued  the  Society  will  in  time  come 
up  more  universally  in  fulfilling  the  evangelical  law  of  righteous 
ness  in  this  respect." 

Again  and  again  the  central  body  repeats  the  advice, 


520    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

and  after  1767  encouraging  statements,  not  numerical, 
of  the  progress  of  the  effort  were  sent  up. 

So  matters  went  on  till  1774.  By  this  time  all 
willing  members  had  freed  their  slaves.  It  remained  to 
be  decided  what  to  do  with  the  unwilling  ones.  The 
Quarterly  and  Monthly  Meetings  were  now  urged  to 
make  one  more  effort  to  convince  the  recalcitrants,  and, 
this  failing,  they  were  to  be  dealt  with  as  offenders 
against  the  discipline.  This  was  strengthened  two  years 
later,  and  the  directions  were  added  to  see  that  all 
manumissions  were  recorded  to  protect  the  blacks  in  the 
future. 

Committees  of  each  Quarterly  Meeting  were  now 
appointed  to  visit  the  homes  of  the  remaining  slave 
holders.  By  urgent  entreaty,  through  these  dark  days 
of  the  Revolutionary  war,  one  after  another  yielded  to 
the  kindly  solicitations,  and  a  few  who  persistently 
refused  were  disowned.1  Thus  did  the  Yearly  Meeting 
extinguish  the  iniquity.  By  1780  no  slaves  were  held 
by  members  except  in  peculiar  cases  where  legal  difficulties 
prevented  manumission,  as  where  husband  or  wife  was  not 
a  member  and  would  not  consent. 

But  the  duty  was  not  yet  quite  accomplished.  The 
minute  of  1758  urged  besides  freedom,  "  making  a 
Christian  provision  for  them  according  to  their  ages." 
This  also  was  a  part  of  the  labour  of  the  committees. 
Where  the  blacks  had  worked  long  and  faithfully  they 
were  not  to  be  turned  away  empty-handed,  and  many  a 
Quaker  ex-slave-holder  paid  a  debt  not  demanded  by  the 
law  for  the  past  unrequited  services  of  his  slaves. 

The  interests  promoted  by  slavery  were  greatly 
reduced  in  Pennsylvania  by  the  freeing  of  the  Quaker 
slaves  and  its  consequent  effect  upon  public  opinion. 
So  that  of  all  the  states  it  was  the  first  to  pass  an 
abolition  law. 

All  this  time  efforts  were  being  made  to  appeal  to 
the  negroes  religiously.  A  few  joined  Friends.  Many 

1  A  manuscript  copy  of  James  Moon's  Journal  describing  those  efforts  in  Bucks 
County  is  in  existence,  which  shows  the  long  and  kindly  and  successful  efforts  of 
one  of  these  committees.  See  Quakerism  and  Politics  by  Isaac  Sharpless. 


CH.  vii  FRIENDS  AND  SLAVERY  521 

attended  the  meetings  appointed  for  them.  Joseph  Oxley 
in  1771  speaks  of  the  "Meetings  for  Negroes  in 
Philadelphia.  Few  there  but  negroes.  They  generally 
sat  soberly."  These  meetings  were  held  quarterly  at 
this  time,  and  frequently  all  through  the  Colonial  period. 
But  the  quiet  of  a  Friends'  meeting  was  not  the  religious 
atmosphere  which  the  race  would  appreciate. 


CHAPTER    VIII 

GENERAL    CONDITIONS,    1700-177$ 

IT  is  difficult  to  estimate  the  number  of  Friends  in  the 
province  of  Pennsylvania  during  Colonial  days.  The 
immigration  was  very  active  at  the  start,  and  the  early 
immigrants  were  largely  Friends.  But  others,  attracted 
by  opportunities  for  trade,  also  came.  The  country 
settlers  were  largely,  in  some  districts  exclusively,  Friends. 
James  Logan  in  1702  estimated  that  the  population  of 
the  city  and  of  the  country  were  equal,  and  that  one- 
third  of  the  former  and  two-thirds  of  the  latter  were 
Friends.  This  would  make  them  one-half  the  population 
at  this  date,  and  as,  later,  non-Friends  came  in  greater 
numbers,  the  proportion  probably  never  reached  this 
figure  again.  In  1698  Gabriel  Thomas,  who  had  lived 
fifteen  years  in  the  province,  said  that  there  were  2000 
houses  in  Philadelphia,  some  of  them  accommodating 
several  families,  and  gives  the  total  population  of  the 
city  as  20,000.  Putting  together  the  statements  of 
James  Logan  and  Gabriel  Thomas,  we  would  infer  that 
about  1700  there  were  20,000  Friends  in  Pennsylvania, 
which  is  doubtless  too  large  a  figure.  Thomas  Lloyd 
writes  as  early  as  1684  that  as  many  as  800  people 
attend  the  Friends'  meeting  in  Philadelphia,  not  all 
Friends,  however.  The  meetings  were  very  large,  surpris 
ing  the  English  visitors.  They  had  not  been  used  to 
such  grouping — a  whole  district  of  several  miles  square, 
containing  hardly  a  family  outside  the  membership. 
A  few  quotations  from  Journals  will  give  an  idea  of 
the  numbers  in  attendance. 

522 


CH.  via  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       523 

James  Dickinson  in  1691  held  meetings  through 
Pennsylvania  in  the  winter  out  of  doors,  sometimes  in 
deep  snow,  the  meeting-houses  not  being  large  enough 
to  contain  the  people. 

Thomas  Chalkley,  writing  in  1701,  says: 

"Since  my  settling  in  the  province  which  is  now  about  a 
year,  some  hundreds  of  people  are  come  here  to  reside  and 
many  meeting  houses  are  built." 

In  1726  he  visited  meetings  in  the  Welsh  Tract  and 
found  "  a  religious,  industrious,  and  increasing  people." 
In  1715  the  Yearly  Meeting  wrote  to  London  : 

"  Our  meeting  hath  been  very  large,  the  people  and  youth 
increasing  much.  .  .  .  Friends  generally  solaced  therein  for  we 
may  truly  say  in  humility  and  fear  the  Lord  is  still  with  his 
people." 

Two  years  later  they  say : 

"  There  is  some  convincement  in  many  places  and  a  great 
increase  of  young  people,  so  there  seems  to  be  occasion  for 
increasing  and  enlarging  our  meeting  houses." 

Samuel  Bownas  speaks  in  1727  of  the  size  of  the 
meetings  through  Chester  County,  amounting  in  several 
cases  to  1500  each.  In  Philadelphia  the  meetings  were 
"  exceedingly  large,"  "  more  like  Yearly  Meetings  than 
common  First  Day  Meetings."  Between  his  two  visits, 
twenty  years  apart,  meeting-houses  had  been  enlarged 
two,  three,  and  four  times,  and  in  Pennsylvania  thirteen 
new  ones  had  been  built.  Ten  places  needed  new  ones 
(1728)  and  many  old  ones  should  be  enlarged. 

In  1754  Samuel  Fothergill  says  that  the  meetings  in 
and  around  Philadelphia  are  "exceedingly  large  and  all 
sorts  and  ranks  of  people  flock  to  them." 

John  Griffith  tells  us  in  1765  that  1500  people 
attended  a  meeting  in  Philadelphia. 

Joseph  Oxley  says  in  1770  of  Philadelphia  Yearly 
Meeting : 

"  The  meetings  were  very  large,  more  so  than  I  have  ever 
seen  in  England,  both  for  worship  and  discipline." 


524    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 
He  says  of  Wilmington,  Del. : 

"Attended  a  very  large  meeting.  The  chief  part  of  the 
inhabitants  of  this  town,  which  is  a  very  improving  one,  are 
under  our  denomination." 

Many  other  testimonies  as  to  the  increasing  size  of 
the  Pennsylvania  meetings  might  be  found.  It  was, 
though  unofficially,  the  State  religion  of  Pennsylvania. 
Its  ministers  were  the  most  active  and  aggressive,  its 
discipline  the  most  effective,  and  its  gatherings  the  most 
imposing  for  numbers  and  solemnity  of  any  religious 
exercises  of  the  colony.  The  Episcopal  minister  of 
Chester  writes  in  1712  with  evident  misgiving  : 

"  I  need  not  tell  you  that  Quakerism  is  generally  preferred  in 
Pennsylvania,  and  in  no  county  of  the  province  does  the  haughty 
tribe  appear  more  rampant  than  where  I  reside,  there  being  by 
a  modest  computation  20  Quakers  besides  dissenters  to  one 
true  Churchman."1 

This  continuous  increase  brought  the  number  of 
Friends  in  the  province  at  the  outbreak  of  the  Revolu 
tion  probably  up  to  25,000,  and  adding  to  this  the 
Friends  of  New  Jersey,  Delaware,  Maryland,  and  Virginia, 
membership  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  may  have  reached 
30,000.  Franklin  in  1766  gave  the  population  of 
Pennsylvania  as  160,000,  of  which  he  said  that  Quakers 
constituted  one-third.  They  probably  did  for  political 
purposes,  and  this  was  what  Franklin  had  in  mind,  but 
the  number  is  too  large  for  the  actual  membership. 
About  the  same  time  another  estimate  gives  the  popula 
tion  as  200,000,  and  of  these  one-eighth  were  said  to  be 
Friends.  The  exact  figures  will  never  be  known,  for  no 
census  was  taken. 

The  average  of  spiritual  life  did  not  grow  with  the 
numbers.  This  was  inevitable  with  birthright  member 
ship.  For  while  the  best  of  Friends  kept  up  the  standards 
a  large  and  increasing  minority  were  Friendly  only  in 
name  and  custom.  John  Smith  of  Marlborough,  whose 

1  Papers  relating  to  the  Church  in  Pennsylvania,  page  69. 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       525 

memory  extended  back  to  about   1 700,  said,  sixty  years 
later,  that  in  these  early  days 

"  Friends  were  a  plain  lowly-minded  people,  and  that  there 
was  much  tenderness  and  contrition  in  their  meetings.  That  at 
20  years  from  that  date,  the  Society  increasing  in  wealth  and  in 
some  degree  conforming  to  the  fashions  of  the  world,  true 
humility  was  less  apparent,  and  their  meetings  in  general  were 
not  so  lively  and  edifying.  That  at  the  end  of  40  years  many 
of  them  were  grown  very  rich  ;  and  many  made  a  specious 
appearance  in  the  world,  that  marks  of  outward  wealth  and 
greatness  appeared  on  some  in  our  meetings  of  ministers  and 
elders,  and  as  such  things  became  more  prevalent  so  the 
powerful  overshadowings  of  the  Holy  Ghost  were  less  manifest 
in  the  Society.  That  there  had  been  a  continual  increase  of 
such  ways  of  life  even  until  the  present  time,  and  that  the  weak 
ness  that  had  now  overspread  the  Society  and  the  barrenness 
manifest  among  us  is  matter  of  much  sorrow." 

Making  all  allowance  for  the  divine  enthusiasm  of 
youth,  this  is  a  striking  statement  and  represents  an 
undoubted  tendency.  John  Smith  may  have  been  mis 
taken  in  associating  wealth  and  show  with  spiritual 
barrenness  strictly  as  cause  and  effect.  They  were 
probably  contemporary  results  of  the  same  causes. 

Samuel  Bownas's  testimony  is  something  the  same. 
Comparing  conditions  of  1727  with  those  of  twenty  years 
earlier,  he  says : 

"  Many  of  the  rising  youth  come  in  form  more  than  in  the 
power  and  life  that  their  predecessors  were  in." 

Yet  he  admits  that  "  there  is  a  fine  living  people 
amongst  them." 

All  through  these  years  there  were  marked  periods 
of  spiritual  interest  and  effectiveness.  Jane  Hoskens, 
writing  about  1712,  says,  "The  Lord  was  pleased  to 
renew  a  merciful  visitation  unto  the  Friends  and  in 
habitants  of  North  Wales  and  Plymouth.  Many  of  the 
youth  were  reached,  and  several  were  called  to  the 
ministry."  And  John  Griffith  writes  : 

"  About  this  time  [1734]  a  fine  spring  of  ministry  was  opened 
within  the  compass  of  our  Yearly  Meeting.  About  100  opened 
their  mouths  in  public  in  a  little  more  than  a  year." 


526    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

This  meant  far  more  than  a  simple  testimony  to 
Christian  conversion.  It  meant  the  beginning  of  a  life  of 
ministry,  though  he  admits  that  "  some  of  them  withered 
away  like  unripe  fruit." 

On  the  whole  during  these  early  days  of  the  century 
the  outlook  was  cheering. 

"The  Truth  prevails  and  prospers  and  great  openness  in 
many  places,  and  many  flocking  to  hear  the  testimonies  of  it, 
and  some  are  convinced,  and  some  that  are  young  coming 
forth  in  testimony;  and  good  discipline  increases  among  the 
churches," 

the  Yearly  Meeting  reported  in  1705.  This  was  the 
general  tone  of  such  statements  for  a  number  of  years. 

But  the  coming  years,  as  John  Smith  intimates,  saw 
changes  not  all  for  the  better. 

Not  only  was  there  in  many  members  a  spiritual 
decline  during  the  century,  but  there  was  also  very  con 
siderable  moral  laxity.  The  offences  for  which  Friends 
were  disowned  in  large  numbers,  mentioned  in  the 
minutes  with  great  plainness,  show  this  clearly.  Life  in 
a  new  country,  when  unaccompanied  by  the  refining 
influences  of  religion  or  education,  brought  out  crude  and 
coarse  manners  and  morals.  Standards  in  the  body  were 
high  and  open  offenders  were  disowned,  but  certain 
departures  from  Christian  conduct  were  not  reached  by 
disciplinary  processes. 

The  various  assemblies  of  the  country  people  at  fairs, 
vendues,  shooting  matches,  games  of  "  hustlecap "  (a 
species  of  pitching  pennies),  gave  rise  to  much  drinking, 
carousing,  and  fighting. 

It  was  not,  however,  only  these  concomitants  that 
were  objected  to.  The  Puritan  objection  to  amusements 
was  applied  to  the  games  themselves,  and  many  a  sport- 
loving  young  Quaker  had  to  apologise  to  the  Meeting 
for  acts  which  would  now  be  part  of  our  settled  habits. 

A  Friend  who  afterwards  became  a  prominent 
minister  admitted  that  he  was  "  frisky "  in  his  early 
years,  and  in  1714  "acknowledged  himself  to  blame  for 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       527 

running  at  a  Horse  Race  at  Chester  Faire,  and  is  heartily 
sorry  for  it  and  hopes  never  to  do  the  like  again." 

A  few  quotations  will  show  the  nature  of  delinquencies 
noticed  by  travelling  Friends  : 

"  Many  showed  themselves  very  disorderly  in  going  frequently 
out  of  meeting  during  the  time  of  worship." 

"  A  large  meeting,  a  dry  lifeless  state  in  too  many  and  incon 
sistent  conduct  in  others,  especially  in  excessive  drinking." 

"  I  was  concerned  to  exhort  Friends  to  purge  the  Society  of 
those  under  our  profession  who  live  in  open  profaneness  and 
are  riotous  in  conversation.  The  Governor  also  issued  a 
proclamation  against  similar  evils.  But  some  young  people 
still  disturbed  our  religious  meetings  and  were  obnoxious  to 
government." 

"There  are  many  earthly-minded  and  some  loose  libertine 
people." 

"  There  is  a  low  vulgar  education  among  the  possessors  of 
Quakerism  here  that  if  they  do  not  feel  and  live  to  what  they 
profess  they  are  very  low  indeed  in  behaviour  and  conduct, 
which  by  a  spirit  of  obstinacy  which  prevails  among  them  is  very 
degrading  to  the  Truth  and  to  Society,  and  especially  in  the 
European  opinion  who  are  brought  up  otherwise.  But  where 
Truth  prevails  it  polishes  and  makes  all  beautiful  and  lively." 

This  last  quotation  refers  to  the  condition  of  Friends 
educationally.  The  study  of  this  condition  will  explain 
a  number  of  failures  of  Quakerism  of  the  Colonial  and 
following  days,  and  is  worth  understanding  in  some  detail. 
Within  a  year  after  Penn's  landing,  Enoch  Flower  was 
commissioned  by  the  Council  to  open  a  school  for 
elementary  work.  About  the  same  time  another  council 
meeting,  William  Penn  presiding,  proposed  that  a  higher 
school  "  of  Arts  and  Sciences  "  be  established.  We  know 
nothing  of  the  subsequent  history  of  either  of  these 
efforts,  but  these  or  other  schools  were  held  in  the 
meeting  -  houses  during  the  next  half  -  dozen  years. 
Gabriel  Thomas  tells  us  in  1698  "there  were  several 
good  schools  of  learning"  in  the  city.  In  1689  William 
Penn  instructed  Thomas  Lloyd  to  set  up  a  "  Public 
Grammar  School."  It  was  immediately  started  and 
George  Keith  made  master.  This  was  the  origin  of  the 


528    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

educational  movement  which  later  became  the  William 
Penn  Charter  School,  still  in  flourishing  existence.  It 
was  intended  as  a  school  for  the  people,  whether  Friends 
or  not,  and  the  poor  were  admitted  free.  There  was  a 
charter  granted  it  by  Deputy -Governor  Markham  in 
1697,  and  again  by  Penn  in  1701,  1708,  and  1711. 
Up  to  1708  the  school  was  a  source  of  much  expenditure 
of  time  and  trouble  to  the  Monthly  Meeting  of  Phila 
delphia,  under  whose  control  it  was  carried  on.  In  the 
charter  of  this  year  it  was  given  over  fully  to  the 
Corporation,  all  of  whom  must  be  Friends.  The  last 
charter  removed  this  restriction,  but  as  the  body  was  self- 
perpetuating  none  but  Friends  have  ever  been  appointed 
to  it.  The  school  under  this  arrangement  continued 
its  beneficent  work  through  the  Colonial  days.  It  was 
generally  patronised  by  Friends  except  such  as  could 
afford  private  instruction.  Mathematical,  classical,  and 
elementary  branch  schools  were  established  for  boys  and 
girls  in  the  city,  and  graded  prices  were  intended  to 
accommodate  families  of  varied  means. 

Other  schools  were  started  in  other  parts  of  the  colony, 
usually  under  the  control  of  a  meeting.  Benjamin  Clift 
was  allowed  £12  a  year  for  a  school  at  Darby,  and 
Christopher  Taylor,  a  University  man  and  prominent  in 
the  official  life  of  the  colony,  had  a  private  school  on 
the  Island  of  Tinicum.  In  1697  the  Yearly  Meeting 
minuted  : 

"  Meetings  [schools  ?]  for  the  education  of  youth  are  settled  in 
most  counties  except  Bucks,  Shrewsbury,  and  Salem." 

These  small  elementary  schools,  encouraged  by  Meeting 
support,  soon  became  rather  general.  But  by  1 746,  there 
appearing  some  reasons  to  make  the  movement  more 
general  or  more  effective,  the  Yearly  Meeting  advised  : 

"We  desire  you,  in  your  several  Monthly  Meetings,  to 
encourage  and  assist  each  other  in  the  settlement  and  support  of 
schools  for  the  instruction  of  your  children,  at  least  to  read  and 
write,  and  some  further  useful  learning,  to  such  whose  circum 
stances  will  permit  it.  And  that  you  observe,  as  much  as 


CH.VIII  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       529 

possible,  to  employ  such  masters  and  mistresses  as  are  con 
cerned,  not  only  to  instruct  your  children  in  their  learning,  but 
are  likewise  careful  in  the  wisdom  of  God  and  a  spirit  of  meek 
ness,  gradually  to  bring  them  to  a  knowledge  of  their  duty  to 
God  and  one  another  ;  and  we  doubt  not  such  endeavors  will  be 
blessed  with  success." 

The  advice  was  renewed  a  few  years  later,  and  by  the 
Revolution  was  acted  on  to  such  an  extent  that  the 
elements  of  education  were  within  the  reach  of  all  Friends 
except  those  on  the  frontiers,  and  not  infrequently  by 
the  conjunction  of  an  ambitious  boy  and  an  inspiring 
teacher,  excellent  scholars  were  produced.  There  are 
several  accounts  of  travellers  being  surprised  to  encounter 
a  farmer  who  read  his  Hebrew  and  Greek  Testaments  or 
spent  his  leisure  times  in  the  solution  of  mathematical 
problems  of  difficulty,  while  John  Bartram  and  some  of 
his  friends  were  botanists  of  the  highest  order. 

John  Smith  of  Philadelphia  and  Burlington  wrote 
a  most  illuminating  journal l  which  gives  us  an  insight 
into  the  private  life  of  the  more  wealthy  and  cultured 
Friends  of  Philadelphia  about  the  middle  of  the  century. 
There  must  have  been  much  book  culture  among  them 
as  well  as  indefinite  sociability  of  the  better  sort.  John 
Smith  himself  read  the  current  books  of  the  day — 
Pope's  Poems,  Addison's  Essays,  and  (strange  to  say), 
Steele's  Comedies  and  Fielding's  novels.  As  he  was  an 
elder  and  clerk  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  besides  holding 
many  responsible  places  in  business  and  public  affairs, 
it  is  evident  that  this  miscellaneous  reading  and  active 
life  did  not  unfit  him,  as  would  later  have  been  the 
case,  for  the  confidence  and  recognition  of  his  associates. 
Interspersed  with  it  we  find  references  to  the  approved 
writings  of  Friends  which  show  that  he  had  also  drunk 
deeply  of  the  literature  and  spirit  of  Quakerism.  His 
own  writings  and  public  appointments  as  companion 
to  many  ministers  would  also  show  this.  The  Logans, 
Pembertons,  Norrises,  Morrises,  Kinseys,  and  others  with 
whom  he  was  connected  by  family  and  social  ties  seem 

1  Hannah.  Logan's  Courtship,  edited  by  Albert  Cook  Myers. 

2  M 


530    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN   COLONIES   BK.  v 

to  have  been  a  most  delightful  combination  of  denomina 
tional  zeal  and  consecration  and  simple  piety  with 
cultivated  minds  and  manners. 

Their  formal  education  was  probably  received  in  part 
in  the  "  public  school,"  in  part  by  private  tuition,  but  it 
was  mostly  gained  as  the  result  of  an  interest  in  good 
things  which  impelled  them  to  educate  themselves  and 
each  other.  The  effect  of  the  reading  of  the  journal, 
never  intended  for  other  eyes  than  his  own,  is  to  impress 
one  with  the  feeling  of  a  community  in  which  wealth, 
public  spirit,  free  and  simple  social  intercourse  and 
recreation,  considerable  mental  culture  and  real  religious 
feeling  were  happily  blended.  At  the  other  extreme  the 
Meeting  minutes  display  a  large  proportion  of  city  vices 
and  ignorance.  The  gap  between  the  extremes  was  much 
wider  than  a  century  and  a  half  later.  This  contrast  is 
often  indicated.  Thomas  Chalkley  tells  us  in  1726: 

"  The  Lord  was  angry  with  the  people  of  Philadelphia  and 
Pennsylvania  for  the  wickedness  committed  by  the  inhabitants 
in  the  public-houses — with  the  magistrates  for  not  enforcing 
laws  against  profaneness  and  immorality — with  the  representatives 
of  the  people  because  they  do  not  suppress  vice  and  immorality 
— and  with  the  better  sort  of  people  because  they  love  the  world 
more  than  heaven." 

The  offenders  may  not  have  been  Friends,  but  the 
magistrates  probably,  and  the  representatives  and  "  better 
sort "  almost  certainly  were.  But  side  by  side  with  this 
he  speaks  of  the  Yearly  Meeting 

"Wherein  divers  young  men  and  women  appeared  who  had 
lately  come  forth  in  the  ministry — a  large  gathering  of  some 
thousands  of  people." 

The  liquor  problem,  as  always,  was  with  these  Colonial 
Friends.  At  first  it  was  rum  supplied  to  Indians  which 
caused  the  trouble,  and  the  Yearly  Meeting  went  so  far 
as  to  order  a  written  pledge  signed  by  individual  members 
through  the  meetings  agreeing  not  to  sell  or  give  away 
any  strong  drink  which  would  be  likely  to  reach  the 
Indians.  Then  their  own  state  officials  were  the  objects 


CH.VIII  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       531 

of  concern,  and  the  legislature  passed  a  law  that  drunken 
ness  should  disqualify  a  man  for  holding  office.  The 
Deputy-Governor,  however,  would  not,  he  said,  penalise  a 
man  for  "  taking  a  cup  too  much." 

A  practice  had  arisen  of  making  a  burial  the  occasion 
of  feasting  and  drinking.  The  vigour  and  frequency  with 
which  the  meetings  combated  this  inexcusable  custom 
shows  hs  hold  upon  the  times.  Such  opportunities  were 
occasions  of  vast  crowds  of  people  gathering,  some  of 
whom  came  from  a  distance,  and  hospitality  demanded 
their  entertainment  But  this  easily  grew  to  excess  and 
caused  anything  but  solemnity. 

"  When  wine  or  other  strong  liquors  are  served  (which  many 
sober-minded  people  think  needless)  that  it  be  but  once  " 

the  Yearly  Meeting  recommended  in  1729. 

They  strove  also  in  meeting  and  legislature  to  abate 
the  evils  of  public-houses,  which  were  centres  of  drunken 
ness  and  crime.  The  remedy  was  to  place  the  business 
in  the  hands  of  men  who  would  wish  to  control  the 
excesses.  It  was  then  respectable  to  patronise  and  own 
such  taverns,  for  they  were  needed  to  accommodate  the 
travel  of  the  times. 

But  the  drink  habit  could  not  be  kept  in  moderation 
in  many  instances.  Ministers  succumbed  as  well  as  the 
humble  people.  In  the  trial  of  Bradford  in  1692  it  was 
intimated  that  the  prominent  Friends  and  ministers  of  the 
day  were  put  to  bed  drunk.1  This  may  be  a  false  charge, 
but  many  other  cases,  hardly  less  conspicuous,  might  be 
cited.  There  were,  however,  most  earnest  efforts  used  by 
all  in  authority  to  remedy  the  evil  of  drunkenness,  and 
those  guilty  of  it  could  not  be  employed  in  church  services. 
There  was  with  the  years  a  growing  stringency  as  to  the 
use  of  spirituous  liquors  which,  however,  in  Colonial  days 
never  reached  the  position  of  total  abstinence. 

But  what  of  the  great  body  of  Friends  who  were 
neither  great  saints  nor  great  sinners,  neither  highly 
educated  nor  grossly  ignorant?  These  constituted  the 

1  Pennypacker's  Colonial  Cases. 


532    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

typical  Quakers  of  Colonial  days.  When  they  got 
together  in  meetings,  it  was  their  voice  which  prevailed, 
their  thoughts  and  feelings  which  set  the  policy  of  the 
society.  The  Yearly  Meeting  was  not  a  reflex  of  the 
educated  leaders  of  the  city,  nor  of  the  more  coarse 
element  among  the  country  people.  Its  standards  were 
determined  very  largely  by  the  strong  democracy  of  the 
farmers.  A  farming  community  is  apt  to  be  conservative, 
to  be  economical,  and  hence  slow  to  take  risks,  or  make 
advances  without  great  deliberation,  but  it  is  also  apt  to 
be  clear-headed,  honest,  direct,  and  moral.  If  we  form 
our  judgment  from  the  offenders  whose  cases  we  read  in 
the  minutes  of  the  Monthly  Meetings,  which  occupy  so 
large  a  proportion  of  the  space,  we  should  infer  that  the 
Friends  were  an  outrageously  demoralised  community. 
But  the  very  fact  that  these  delinquents  are  dealt  with 
so  plainly  and  without  any  condoning  of  their  faults, 
or  relaxation  of  the  standards,  shows  that  there  was 
everywhere  a  prevailing  majority,  of  whom  we  read 
nothing  directly,  who  stood  with  unyielding  sincerity  for 
righteousness. 

The  journals  of  travelling  Friends  are  most  unsatis 
factory  exponents  of  actual  conditions.  They  are  full  of 
subjective  expressions,  telling  how  the  minister  felt  very 
"  low,"  or  that  the  meeting  was  "  lively,"  which  judgments 
might  have  resulted  from  the  writer's  physical  or  spiritual 
condition  at  the  time,  or  might  have  been  a  reflex  of  the 
external  attitude  of  the  Friends.  It  is  impossible  to  doubt 
that  the  former  often  dictated  the  expressions  in  the 
journal.  Thus  to  John  Griffith,  who  travelled  about  1765 
through  the  Yearly  Meeting,  things  were  "  mournfully  low," 
"  few  seemed  alive,"  "  great  weakness  and  want  of  living 
concern,"  "  religion  at  a  low  ebb,"  and  many  other  such 
disconsolate  expressions.  While  to  Joseph  Oxley,  who 
journeyed  over  the  same  territory  about  the  same  time — 

"  The  affairs  of  the  church  were  carried  on  in  much  brotherly 
love  and  condescension,  a  very  great  deal  of  becoming  plainness 
and  honest  simplicity  being  coupled  together  in  the  fear  of  God. 

"  The  meetings  for  the  most  part  have  been  large,  comfortable, 


CH.  vni  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       533 

and  to  edification,  many  mothers  with  their  infants  attending,  the 
zeal  of  the  mothers  I  thought  sufficiently  compensating  for  the 
cries  of  the  babes. 

"  The  meeting  held  fresh  and  green  mostly  for  six  hours." 

It  is  impossible  to  reconcile  the  saddening  experiences 
of  the  one  with  the  hopeful  expressions  of  the  other,  except 
by  the  differing  temperaments  of  the  writers. 

The  whole  tenor  of  the  teaching  was  inward.  The 
best  Friends  have  always  been  mystics,  and  mysticism  is 
seldom  so  pure  and  exalted  as  to  free  itself  from  an 
admixture  of  the  elements  which  come  from  mental 
buoyancy  or  good  digestion  on  the  one  hand,  or  the 
reverse  conditions  on  the  other.  Hence  our  Quaker 
journals  must  be  read  between  the  lines. 

It  can  hardly  be  doubted,  however,  that  there  was  a 
steady  increase  in  the  proportion  of  unspiritual  Friends 
as  the  century  advanced.  The  journalistic  testimony  in 
its  entirety  would  point  to  this  conclusion.  Prosperity, 
leadership  in  public  affairs,  birthright  membership,  absence 
of  the  means  of  education,  opened  increasing  temptations 
to  a  non- religious  life.  The  sweetness  and  light  and 
enthusiasm  of  the  first  fifty  years  were  passing  away. 
While  many  maintained  the  spirit  and  standards  of  the 
older  days,  a  number,  large  in  the  aggregate,  were 
indifferent,  substituting  formalism  for  piety.  Some  weare 
openly  rebellious,  in  spite  of,  or  perhaps  in  consequence 
of,  the  increasing  stringency  of  disciplinary  requirements. 

The  matters  with  which  the  Yearly  Meeting  concerned 
itself  in  its  endeavour  to  keep  to  simple  standards  were 
very  detailed.  In  1694  it  testified  against  challenging  to 
run  races,  wrestling,  pitching  "  barrs,"  "  drinking  to  one 
another,"  "  riding  from  house  to  house  to  drink  rum  and 
other  strong  liquors  to  excess,"  "  to  jest  or  talk  idly,"  "  for 
children  to  answer  parents  forwardly  or  crossly,"  "  the 
immoderate  and  indecent  smoking  of  tobacco,"  "  to  ride 
or  go  in  the  streets  with  pipes  in  their  mouths,"  and  so 
on.  This  list  is  interesting  as  showing  the  customs  of 
the  age  as  well  as  the  care  of  the  Yearly  Meeting.  A 
little  later  it  testifies  against  drunkenness,  "  a  prevailing 


534    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

evil,"  against  such  as  "hold  Truth  for  worldly  ends," 
"  publishing  books  to  raise  contention,"  importing  slaves, 
"  marrying  out,"  "  using  unscriptural  language," — thus 
mingling  together  serious  moral  evils  and  the  breaking  of 
the  special  testimonies  of  Friends. 

In  1695  the  meeting  advised  that  all  Friends  keep  to 
plainness  in  apparel,  and  specified  as  innovations  to  be 
avoided  "  long-lapped  sleeves  or  coats  gathered  at  the 
sides  or  superfluous  buttons  or  broad  ribbons  about  their 
hats  or  long-curled  periwigs,"  and  that  women  should  not 
dress  "  their  heads  immoderately,"  or  "  wear  long  scarves," 
or  buy  "striped  or  flowered  stuffs,"  and  that  Friendly 
tailors,  who  presumably  would  not  sell  these  gaudy 
innovations,  be  dealt  with  exclusively.  They  also  urge 
that  excesses  in  building  and  furniture  be  avoided,  that 
business  be  kept  down  to  moderate  dimensions,  and  that 
debts  be  promptly  paid.  The  reason  they  give  in  1701 
for  these  advices  is  worth  reading : 

"  Earth  was  made  for  the  service  of  man,  not  man  for  the 
service  of  the  earth.  .  .  .  How  ignoble  and  debasing  a  thing  it 
is  for  a  man  to  divert  that  noble,  gracious,  primitive  institution 
in  which  he  was  advanced  to  a  divine  dominion,  and  yield 
himself  a  slave  to  that  over  which  he  once  was  and  still  should 
be  lord." 

In  nearly  all  the  meetings,  acting  on  many  "advices," 
beginning  with  Burlington  in  1681,  the  Monthly  Meetings 
appointed  two  Friends  each  to  settle  differences  amicably, 
to  prevent  defamation  of  character  by  untrue  or  libellous 
reports,  to  administer  the  discipline  as  to  attendance  at 
and  proper  behaviour  in  meeting,  and  to  look  after  the 
habits  of  Friends  as  to  plainness  of  living  and  sobriety 
of  conduct  These  officials  were  probably  not  called 
Overseers  before  1700,  but  soon  after  the  name  seems 
to  have  been  pretty  general.  About  the  same  time 
Preparative  Meetings  were  set  up,  to  attend  to  the  more 
personal  work  required  to  bring  the  business  in  good 
shape  to  the  Monthly  Meetings.  The  overseers  were 
originally  the  appointees  of  these  Preparative  Meetings, 
which  consisted  of  the  more  experienced  and  reliable 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       535 

Friends  only.  In  case  of  an  offender  these  overseers  and 
the  Preparative  Meetings  were  expected  quietly  to  reform 
him,  and  long-continued  efforts  were  made  to  this  end. 
If  they  succeeded,  no  record  was  made  of  the  case. 
Should  he  prove  not  amenable  to  such  influences,  the 
Monthly  Meeting  was  informed,  and  more  formal  proceed 
ings  instituted,  resulting  either  in  his  acknowledgment 
of  culpability  and  reinstatement  in  good  standing  or 
disownment.  While  therefore  the  records  of  the  Monthly 
Meetings,  which  have  been  preserved,  seem  to  indicate 
rather  abrupt  and  arbitrary  proceedings,  they  give  us  no 
indication  of  the  private  labours  which  preceded  them,  of 
which  we  have  no  official  accounts. 

The  creation  of  Preparative  Meetings  was  made 
optional  with  Quarterly  Meetings  in  1698,  and  we  find 
John  Churchman,  as  late  as  1758,  advising  their  establish 
ment  in  places  where  they  were  unknown. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  "  Queries "  had  a  large 
effect  in  maintaining  the  discipline  and  standards  of  the 
Quaker  community.  As  we  have  seen,  there  was  an 
attempt  made  in  1703  to  codify  and  arrange  the  advices 
and  instructions  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  into  a  formal 
"  Discipline."  Manuscript  copies  of  this  were  made,  and 
were  added  to  as  new  conclusions  were  reached.  This 
Book  of  Discipline  was  read  quarterly  in  the  meetings 
for  worship.  To  it  was  often  appended  an  epistle  of 
doctrinal  advice  and  earnest  exhortation  to  spiritual  and 
holy  living.  In  1707  it  was  concluded  to  call  the 
Quarterly  Meetings  by  name,  and  each  one  was  to 
answer  as  to  the  conduct  of  its  members.  Two  years 
later  these  reports  were  to  be  in  "wrighting." 

The  varied  questions  which  the  Friends  of  those  days 
had  under  consideration,  and  which  the  Preparative 
Meetings  and  the  overseers  were  expected  to  attend  to, 
may  be  seen  in  a  minute  of  Chester  Quarterly  Meeting 
of  1711.  They  were  instructed  to  look  into  the  following 
offences : — 

"That  against  inviting  servants  to  marriages,  except  near 
relations.  That  against  going  to  the  marriages  of  any  that 


536    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

profess  Truth,  but  marry  not  among  Friends.  That  of  keeping 
company  in  order  for  marriage  with  any  one's  servant  without 
leave  of  master  or  mistress.  That  about  being  clear  of  one 
before  being  concerned  with  another.  That  of  being  too  hasty 
in  marriage  after  the  death  of  husband  or  wife,  and  against 
marriage  by  priests.  That  against  giving  occasion  of  public 
scandal,  and  that  against  all  disorderly  walkers  in  general.  That 
about  Friends  putting  their  children  to  apprentices,  or  otherwise 
to  be  brought  up  by  those  who  are  not  Friends.  That  about 
parents  causing  their  children  often  to  read  the  Holy  Scriptures, 
and  to  let  them  know  some  degree  of  writing ;  and  that  they  be 
bred  up  in  some  useful  employment.  That  against  drinking  to 
excess,  swearing,  cursing,  lying,  etc.  That  against  superfluity  of 
apparel  and  furniture  in  all  its  branches.  That  against  calling 
the  days  and  months  contrary  to  Scripture,  and  against  calling 
them  by  the  names  of  the  idol  gods  of  the  heathen.  That  about 
speaking  the  plain  Scripture  language  of  thee  and  thou.  That 
against  buying  and  trading  beyond  abilities,  and  of  not  keeping 
to  our  words  and  promises.  That  about  attending  Weekly 
Meetings,  and  against  disorderly  going  in  and  out ;  and  against 
sleeping  in  meetings.  That  against  smoking  tobacco  in  streets, 
roads,  and  public-houses,  except  privately.  That  against  talking 
and  tale -bearing.  That  against  giving  any  just  occasion  of 
trouble  to  the  government,  and  against  our  refusing  to  pay  its 
tributes  or  assessments.  That  against  selling  rum  to  the  Indians, 
and  against  buying  Indian  slaves.  That  against  brother  going  to 
law  with  brother,  as  explained  or  amended  by  the  last  Yearly 
Meeting  held  at  Burlington.  That  against  challenging  to  fight, 
etc.  That  against  keeping  vain  or  loose  company,  in  fairs, 
markets,  drinking-houses,  or  any  other  places,  etc.  That  against 
vain  and  frothy  discourses,  drinking  to  excess,  and  against  a  vain 
custom  of  drinking  healths,  as  it  is  called,  and  against  drinking 
one  to  another." 

Reports  on  these  subjects  were  to  be  made  to  the 
Quarterly  Meetings  usually  at  first  by  word  of  mouth  of 
the  representatives.  Gradually  to  induce  uniformity, 
definite  subjects  were  proposed  for  report,  and  about 
1725  these  crystallised  into  "  Queries."  They  were 
adopted  as  a  matter  of  convenience,  and  were  not 
uniform  through  the  Yearly  Meeting.  That  body  in 
1743  systematised  the  plan  by  the  following  minute, 
which  is  interesting  alike  as  a  means  of  discipline  and  as 
an  expression  of  standards : 


CH.  vni  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       537 

"  This  meeting  directs  that  the  following  queries  may  be  read 
in  the  several  Monthly  and  Preparative  Meetings  within  the  verge 
of  this  meeting,  at  least  once  in  each  quarter  of  the  year ;  to  the 
end  that  the  overseers,  or  other  weighty  Friends,  may  make  such 
answers  to  them  as  they  may  be  able  to  do,  and  their  respective 
circumstances  may  require.  The  members  of  such  meetings  may, 
by  this  means,  be  from  time  to  time  reminded  of  their  duty. 

"  I.  Are  Friends  careful  to  attend  their  meetings  for  worship, 
both  on  first-days  and  other  days  of  the  week  appointed  for  that 
service  ?  and  are  they  careful  to  meet  at  the  hour  appointed  ? 
Do  they  refrain  from  sleeping  in  meetings  ?  or  do  any  accustom 
themselves  to  snuffing  or  chewing  tobacco  in  meetings  ? 

"II.  Do  Friends  keep  clear  of  excess,  either  in  drinking 
drams  or  other  strong  drink  ? 

"  III.  Are  there  any  who  keep  company,  in  order  for  marriage, 
with  those  who  are  not  of  us,  or  with  any  others  without  the 
consent  of  parents  or  guardians  ? 

"IV.  Do  Friends  keep  clear  from  tattling,  tale-bearing, 
whispering,  backbiting,  and  meddling  in  matters  wherein  they 
are  not  concerned  ? 

"  V.  Are  there  any  Friends  that  frequent  music  houses,  or  go 
to  dancing  or  gaming  ? 

"  VI.  Are  Friends  careful  to  train  up  their  children  in  the 
nurture  and  fear  of  the  Lord,  and  to  restrain  them  from  vice  and 
evil  company,  and  to  keep  them  to  plainness  of  speech  and 
apparel  ? 

"VII.  Are  the  poor  taken  care  of  and  are  their  children  put 
to  school  and  apprenticed  out  (after  sufficient  learning)  to 
Friends  ?  and  do  Friends  put  their  own  children  out  to  Friends, 
as  much  as  may  be  ? 

"  VIII.  Are  there  any  who  launch  into  business  beyond  what 
they  are  able  to  manage,  and  so  break  their  promises,  in  not 
paying  their  just  debts  in  due  time?  And  where  differences 
happen,  are  endeavors  used  to  have  them  speedily  ended  ? 

"IX.  Are  there  any  belonging  to  this  meeting  that  are 
removed  without  certificates  ?  or  are  there  any  from  other  parts 
appearing  as  Friends,  and  have  not  produced  a  certificate  ? 

"  X.  Are  Friends  clear  of  depriving  the  King  of  his  duties  ? 

"XI.  Do  Friends  observe  the  former  advices  of  the  Yearly 
Meeting,  not  to  encourage  the  importation  of  negroes,  nor  to 
buy  them  after  imported  ? 

"  XII.  Are  Friends  careful  to  settle  their  affairs  and  make 
their  wills  in  time  of  health  ?  " 

These    queries   were   not    at    first   formally  answered. 


538    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

They  seem  to  have  been  for  the  purpose  of  reminding 
members  of  their  duties  and  of  testing  the  work  of  the 
overseers.  The  list  was  modified  from  time  to  time,  and 
in  1755  a  definite  answer  to  each  query  was  demanded, 
which  answers  were  co-ordinated  through  the  various 
grades,  and  finally  reaching  the  Yearly  Meeting  were 
intended  fairly  to  represent  the  state  of  the  Society.  The 
formal  queries  induced,  however,  formal  answers,  and  it 
is  doubtful  if  the  information  was  as  illuminating  as 
when  a  freer  expression  was  permitted,  as  in  the  earlier 
days. 

The  practice  of  the  ministers  or  "public  Friends"  meeting 
together  apart  from  others  originated  in  Philadelphia,  in 
1685,  and  soon  became  general  over  the  Yearly  Meeting. 
At  first  no  regular  authorisation  of  a  minister  was  necessary. 
Any  one  who  spoke  acceptably  in  the  meetings  for 
worship  was  a  minister.  But  in  a  little  time  objectionable 
speakers  would  make  trouble,  and  it  was  decided  that  all 
ministers  in  order  to  attend  these  meetings  must  bring  a 
certificate  of  acceptability  from  their  Monthly  Meetings. 
These  bodies,  therefore,  became  the  appointing  power. 

In  1714,  in  response  to  numerous  suggestions  from 
Monthly  Meetings  that  a  few  other  Friends  be  authorised 
to  sit  with  the  ministers,  the  Yearly  Meeting  sent  down 
this  minute : — 

"This  meeting  agrees  that  each  monthly  meeting  (where 
meetings  of  ministers  are  or  may  be  held)  shall  appoint  two  or 
more  Friends  to  sit  with  the  ministers  in  their  meetings  ;  taking 
care  that  the  Friends  chosen  for  that  service  be  prudent  solid 
Friends  and  that  they  do  carefully  discharge  their  trust  in  such 
matters,  and  in  such  manner  as  the  monthly  meeting  shall  from 
time  to  time  see  occasion  to  appoint  them." 

This  meant  elders,  whose  duties  at  first  were  scantily 
defined.  In  a  little  time  they  were  expected  to  assist  and 
encourage  acceptable  ministers  either  by  spiritual  or 
temporal  counsel,  and  to  discourage  ill-advised  utterances. 
In  time  they  became  a  great  power,  and  their  repressive 
influence  was  sometimes  exerted  out  of  proportion  to 
its  value. 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       539 

In  1740  the  Yearly  Meeting  defined  its  previous 
minute  to  include  women  Friends,  and  the  meeting  for 
ministers  and  elders,  or  Select  Meeting,  became  a  con 
stituent  part  of  the  church  machinery,  usually  assembling 
just  in  advance  of  the  Yearly,  Quarterly  or  Monthly 
Meetings  respectively. 

The  large  meetings  which  we  find  mentioned  in  all  the 
journals  were  drawn  together  by  mixed  motives.  In 
many  sections  there  were  no  other  places  of  worship  than 
the  Friends'  meeting-houses.  The  means  of  travel  were 
limited,  being  practically  reduced  to  walking  and  horseback. 
Where  there  were  other  religious  services  the  sentiment 
against  attending  them  was  too  strong  to  be  resisted. 

The  overseers  were  active  in  giving  official  encourage 
ment  to  regular  attendance,  and  persistent  absence  was  a 
cause  of  disownment.  The  social  opportunity  was  valued 
by  young  and  old,  and  the  traditions  of  the  earlier 
generations,  reinforced  by  Yearly  Meeting  advices  and  the 
sermons  of  many  itinerant  ministers,  created  a  strong 
feeling  that  a  meeting  was  a  fixed  engagement  to  which 
all  else  must  bend.  Did  a  farmer  have  hay  cut  in  his 
field  to  be  injured  by  a  storm  appearing  over  the  horizon  ? 
The  hay  might  suffer,  but  the  mid-week  meeting  must  not 
be  neglected.  Did  a  storekeeper  expect  a  valued  customer 
at  meeting  hour?  The  store  must  be  closed,  and  he  and 
all  his  clerks  must  attend  the  religious  service.  Nothing 
but  physical  disability  was  a  valid  excuse  for  an  omission 
of  the  prime  duty. 

It  is  true  that  the  overworked  farmer  might  sleep 
through  the  meeting,  or  the  city  clerk  interest  himself  in 
the  contemplation  of  a  young  lady  across  the  aisle,  but 
anyhow  he  must  attend.  It  is  even  possible  that  the 
serious-faced  men  and  women  facing  the  meeting  were 
not  so  continuously  and  exclusively  engaged  in  personal 
worship  as  their  attitudes  would  seem  to  indicate  to  an 
observant  youth.  But  that  many  solid  and  sincere 
Christians,  who  above  all  things  permanently  desired  to 
do  God's  will,  were  produced  by  this  system  of  home  life 
and  communal  worship  is  beyond  dispute.  And  that 


540    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

such  honest  souls  were  continuously  in  control  of  the 
tendencies  of  the  Society  seems  also  pretty  certain. 

John  Churchman  in  1748  divided  the  Friends  he 
visited  into  three  classes — those  who  were  glad  to  hear 
him  and  invited  him  home,  though  "  without  much  sweetness 
of  truth  about  their  houses,"  and  would  tell  him  he  had 
hit  the  nail  on  the  head  exactly  in  his  sermons ;  those 
who  dealt  out  his  exhortations  censoriously  to  others,  but 
did  not  with  any  penitence  take  them  to  themselves  ;  and 
those,  "  a  few  in  each  meeting,"  who  humbly  acknowledged 
their  own  weakness  and  the  weakness  of  the  church.  It 
was  this  last  class  upon  whom,  as  he  deemed,  the  hope  of 
the  Society  must  rest. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  peripatetic  ministers, 
both  English  and  American,  had  a  great  influence  in 
strengthening  and  preserving  Quakerism  among  the 
colonists.  They  were  the  most  spiritual  and  often  the 
best  educated  men  and  women  of  the  Society.  They 
were  listened  to,  especially  those  from  England,  with  the 
greatest  respect.  Their  journals  nearly  always  speak  of 
the  great  crowds  which  attended  their  ministry.  George 
Keith,  after  his  separation,  said  that  it  was  these  "  travelling 
preachers  that  kept  the  Quakers  so  strong  in  countenance," 
and  in  some  colonies,  in  order  to  stop  the  increase  of 
Quakerism,  the  early  New  England  plan  of  prohibiting 
their  journeying  was  in  the  eighteenth  century  seriously 
proposed.  Besides  the  numerous  American  "  public 
Friends,"  of  whom  there  were  nearly  always  one  or  more 
in  the  field,  the  following  ministers  from  abroad  were 
engaged  in  religious  visits  in  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting: — 


1684 
1687 

1691 

1694 
1695 

James  Martin 
Roger  Longworth  . 
Thomas  Wilson  ^ 
James  Dickinson  J 
Thomas  Musgrove  . 
Robert  Barrow 
Ralph  Wardell 
Jonathan  Tyler        . 

London. 
Lancashire. 

.     Ireland. 

•            » 
Westmorland. 
Sunderland. 
.     Wiltshire. 

1  Brackets  indicate  that  the  ministers  travelled  together  the  whole  or  part  of 
the  time. 


CH.  viii  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       541 


1696     Jacob  Fallowfield    . 
Henry  Payton) 
Sarah  Clark     / 

1698  William  Ellis     | 
Aaron  Atkinson/ 
Thomas  Chalkley) 
Thomas  Turner    / 
Elizabeth  Webb) 
Mary  Rogers      / 
Thomas  Story) 
Roger  Gill       / 
Elizabeth  Gamble  . 

1699  Sarah  Clemens 

1700  John  Salkeld 
Thomas  Thompson  | 
Josiah  Langdale       J 
John  Richardson     . 
John  Estaugh 

1703  Samuel  Bownas 

1704  Thomas  Turner 
Joseph  Glaister 
Mary  Banister 
Mary  Ellerton 

1706  John  Fothergill        1 
William  Armisteadj 

1707  Patrick  Henderson  1 
Samuel  Wilkinson  / 

1709     William  Baldwin     . 

1713     Thomas  Wilson  "1 
James  Dickinson/ 

1715  Thomas  Thompson) 
Josiah  Langdale  / 
Benjamin  Holme  . 

1717  William  Armstrong  ) 
James  Graham         / 

1718  John  Danton  \ 
Isaac  Hadwin/ 
Elizabeth  Rawlinson) 
Lydia  Lancaster        / 

1719  Rebecca  Turner          ) 
Elizabeth  Whartnabyj" 

1720  John  Appleton 

1721  Margaret  Langdale 
Margaret  Payne 
John  Fothergill) 
Laurence  King  / 

1722  Benjamin  Kidd 
1725     Abigail  Bowles 


Hertford 
London. 

Yorkshire. 
England. 


Barbadoes. 

London. 

Westmorland. 

Essex. 

Yorkshire. 

» 

Essex. 

Westmorland. 
Essex. 

Cumberland. 
London. 
York. 

Yorkshire. 

North  of  Ireland. 

Lancashire. 

Ireland. 

Essex. 

Yorkshire. 

York. 

Cumberland. 

Swarthmore. 

Lancaster. 
Westmorland. 

England. 

Lincolnshire. 
England. 

5> 

Yorkshire. 

Banbury. 
Ireland. 


542    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 


1726  William  Piggottl 
Joshua  Fielding/ 
Samuel  Bownas 

1728     Rowland  Wilson  \ 
Joseph  Taylor     / 

1731  Henry  Frankland    . 
John  Richardson     . 

1732  Mungo  Bewley    "j 
Paul  Johnson        J- 
Samuel  Stephens] 
Alice  Alderson) 
Hannah  Dent  / 
Margaret  Copeland 

1734     John  Burton  . 

William  Backhouse 

Joseph  Gill 
1736     John  Fothergill 

John  Tylee     . 

Ruth  Courtney    \ 

Susanna  Hudson/ 

1738  John  Hunt 

1739  Thomas  Gawthrop  . 

1741  Samuel  Hopwood    . 

1742  Edmund  Peckover  . 
John  Haslam 

I744(?)  Christopher  Wilson 

Eliezar  Sheldon 
1747     Samuel  Nottingham 
1750     Josiah  Thompson    . 
James  Thornton 
Mary  Weston 

1753  Mary  Peisley 
Catherine  Payton    . 

1754  Samuel  Fothergill  . 
Joshua  Dixon 

1757  William  Reckitt 
Samuel  Spavold 
Mary  Kirby  . 

1760  John  Storer    . 
Jane  Crosfield 
George  Mason 
Susannah  Hutton    . 

1761  Robert  Proud 
John  Stephenson     . 
Hannah  Harris 
Elizabeth  Wilkinson 
Alice  Hall      . 

1765     John  Griffith  . 


London. 
England. 

it 

Yorkshire. 

H 

Ireland. 

Yorkshire. 

Westmorland. 

Yorkshire. 

Lancashire. 

Ireland. 

Yorkshire. 

Bristol. 

Ireland. 

London. 

Westmorland. 

Cornwall. 

Norfolk. 

Yorkshire. 

Cumberland. 

Ireland. 

England. 


Ireland. 

Warrington. 

Durham. 

Lincolnshire. 

Hertfordshire. 

Norfolk. 

Nottingham. 

Westmorland. 

Yorkshire. 

England. 


Essex. 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       543 

1765     Abigail  Pike  ....  England. 

1768     Rachel  Wilson        .  .  .  Kendal. 

1770     Joseph  Oxley           .  .  .  Norwich. 

Samuel  Neale          .  .  .  Ireland. 

1773     Robert  Walker        .  .  .  Yorkshire. 

Elizabeth  Robinson  .  .             „ 

Mary  Leaver           .  .  .  Nottingham. 

During  the  ninety-three  years  which  intervened  between 
the  founding  of  the  Colony  and  the  Revolutionary  War 
over  one  hundred  Friends  from  outside  America  engaged 
in  this  travelling  ministry.  Many  of  them  would  spend 
years  in  the  country.  The  meetings  of  Friends  in  and 
around  Philadelphia  would  therefore  frequently  be  visited. 
And  not  the  meetings  only.  Many  of  the  ministers 
would  visit  families,  speaking  to  the  conditions  of  the 
individual  members.  After  a  little  time  of  silence,  with 
all  the  assurance  of  Hebrew  prophets  they  would  lay  bare 
internal  conditions  and  address  themselves  to  personal 
weaknesses.  It  seemed  to  many  a  member  of  the  quiet 
assembly  that  an  unerring  insight  brought  their  secret 
thoughts  and  hidden  actions  to  judgment  or  gave  them 
the  special  spiritual  message  which  their  souls  craved. 
The  frequent  recurrence  of  such  public  and  private 
opportunities  made  an  indelible  impress  on  many  a  young 
Friend.  A  young  woman  writes  about  1712: 

"  Infinite  goodness  .  .  .  was  pleased  to  send  his  servants,  both 
male,  and  female,  filled  with  life  and  power  who  sounded  forth 
the  gospel  in  Divine  authority." 

This  was  the  spirit  in  which  such  messages  were 
received.  The  effect  of  these  family  visits  by  home  and 
foreign  ministers  in  the  aggregate  was  very  large.  The 
authority  of  the  word  was  hardly  doubted  even  when  not 
received,  and  not  a  few  transformations  of  life  were 
wrought,  where  an  open  heart  existed.  Such  visits  were 
repeatedly  advised  by  the  meetings,  and  were  a  very  large 
part  of  the  practice  and  policy  of  the  Friends. 

The  attitude  of  the  Friends  to  other  denominations 
was  not  marked  by  any  large  tolerance.  The  Colony 
beyond  all  others  taught  freedom  of  worship  and  equal 


544    QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

civil  rights  of  all,  but  the  Friends  had  testimonies  to  bear 
which  prevented  any  approach  to  religious  unity.  In 
1711  they  were  urged  not  to  go  to  the  "  worship  houses  " 
of  other  bodies,  or  even  to  listen  to  their  sermons  at 
funerals.  This  was  not  so  much  for  fear  of  doctrinal 
influence  upon  themselves  as  because  they  wished  to  bear 
their  testimony  against  a  "  paid  and  stated  ministry,"  a 
ministry  exercised  not  under  the  immediate  conscious 
propelling  power  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

All  the  needed  expenses  of  the  travelling  ministers 
were  met  with  a  liberal  hand,  collections  being  some 
times  taken  at  the  times  of  meetings  for  worship,  but  a 
distinct  line  was  drawn  between  payments  for  necessary 
expenses  and  payments  for  preaching.  Many  references 
were  made  in  the  journals  to  silence,  because  the  minister 
felt  that  the  worshippers  were  becoming  too  dependent 
upon  words.  "  The  people  seemed  full  of  expectation 
from  one  come  so  far,"  said  the  Englishman  John  Griffith, 
"  but  I  was  shut  up."  This  perfect  freedom  of  ministry 
was  the  choicest  possession  of  the  early  Friends.  For 
this  they  would  not  recognise  the  pre-arranged  services  of 
other  religious  bodies  even  by  attendance.  For  this  they 
sacrificed  all  special  theological  education,  and  tried  to 
judge  a  message  by  its  spirit  rather  than  its  form.  Yet 
the  unbounded  hospitality  of  a  new  country,  the  profound 
reverence  felt  for  those  who  gave  forth  the  Word  of  God, 
insured  against  suffering  all  who  needed  financial  aid. 
If  a  man  could  by  business  operations  sustain  himself 
against  the  day  of  travel,  he  felt  it  a  privilege  to  be  free 
of  the  help  of  his  friends,  and  his  message  derived  a 
greater  power  and  freedom  from  this  knowledge  that  no 
thoughts  of  pleasing  the  people  intruded  themselves 
into  it. 

Next  to  the  personal  influence  of  the  spiritual  Friends 
was  the  literature  of  the  Society.  Books  published  in 
England  or  Philadelphia  were  subscribed  to  by  the 
Monthly  Meetings,  and  circulated  among  the  members. 
Thus  endorsed  they  became  almost  as  authoritative  as 
the  Bible,  and  were  read  with  undoubted  confidence.  We 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       545 

have  from  an  unfriendly  source  the  effect  of  the  teaching 
of  Barclay's  Apology.  An  Episcopal  minister  writes  in 
1740  about  a  man  who  had  brought  a  wife  and  nine 
children  to  baptism  : 

"  His  misfortune  was  as  to  this  particular  that  his  wife  was  a 
Quaker,  and  her  Quaker  relations  plyed  him  with  heretical  books 
especially  Robert  Barclay's  Apology,  the  glory  and  Alcoran  of 
Friends.  'Tis  a  pity  it  escapes  so  long  a  clear  and  full  confuta 
tion  and  I  beg  leave  to  say  that  some  of  our  acutest  have  been 
worse  employed  than  in  taking  that  hurtful  work  to  pieces. 
Smith's  Preservative  was  of  use  to  me  in  gaining  the  family  I 
spoke  of  and  if  that  gentleman  is  alive  I  hereby  tender  him  my 
thanks  for  his  endeavours  to  pull  down  this  stronghold  of  Satan, 
Barclay's  Works." x 

In  addition  to  the  works  of  Fox  and  Barclay,  Sewel's 
History  of  Quakers  was  thus  distributed,  also  the  works  of 
William  Dell  (who  was  not  a  Friend),  Moses  West's  book 
against  mixed  marriages,  Daniel  Pastorius'  "  Primmer " 
and  others.  The  meeting  agreed  in  1705  to  have  at 
least  one  copy  of  every  suitable  Friends'  book  printed  in 
England  sent  over  for  inspection. 

In  1690  all  books  approved  by  the  meeting  of  "Public 
Friends  "  were  to  be  taken  by  the  Yearly  Meeting  to  the 
extent  of  two  hundred  copies  each  and  given  to  the 
Monthly  Meetings.  The  same  meeting  opened  a  sub 
scription  to  pay  for  an  authorised  printer,  who  was  at 
first  William  Bradford.  His  usefulness  ended  a  couple  of 
years  later  when  he  imprudently  espoused  the  cause  of 
George  Keith.  He  had,  however,  a  line  of  successors.  In 
1703  the  management  of  the  press  was  turned  over  to 
the  Monthly  Meeting  of  Philadelphia,  and  Isaac  Norris 
went  to  England  to  find  a  printer,  "  a  Friend  if  possible." 
A  few  years  later  absolute  power  was  given  to  any  five  of 
a  committee  of  eight  appointed  by  that  meeting  to  issue 
official  documents.  Later  still  the  Yearly  Meeting 
resumed  its  care  of  publications,  acting  through  the 
"Overseers  of  the  Press,"  till  1771,  when  the  matter  went 
to  the  "  Meeting  for  Sufferings." 

1  Papers  relating  to  the  Church  in  Pennsylvania. 

2  N 


546    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

All  through  these  years  Friends  seemed  impressed 
with  the  fact  that  they  were  making  history,  and  that 
Pennsylvania  was  a  test  of  Quaker  principles  applied  to 
government.  They  were  urged  to  live  worthy  of  their 
origin,  and  not  to  allow  the  work  to  go  down  in  their 
hands.  The  Yearly  Meeting  early  began  the  task  of 
collecting  valuable  material,  and  the  minutes  show 
through  whose  hands  the  collection  passed.  Cabel  Pusey, 
the  zealous  and  trusted  friend  of  Penn,  whose  many  places 
in  State  and  Church  show  the  esteem  in  which  he  was  held, 
was  the  custodian  till  his  death  in  1725.  Following  him 
were  David  Lloyd,  Isaac  Norris,  James  Logan,  and  John 
Kinsey,  each  of  whom  added  something,  and  probably  each 
of  whom  had  some  indefinite  intentions  of  writing  the 
history.  After  the  death  of  John  Kinsey  in  1750,  Samuel 
Smith  received  the  papers  and  compiled  a  manuscript. 
This  was  not  published  in  its  original  form  till  1830  in 
Hazard's  Register.  Between  1776  and  1780  Robert 
Proud,  the  master  of  Friends'  School,  compiled  a  History 
of  Pennsylvania  which  is  still  the  highest  authority  on  all 
things  colonial.  He  had  all  the  collections  of  the  previous 
decades  as  well  as  Smith's  manuscript  in  his  hands  and 
added  his  personal  knowledge.  Thus  the  care  of  the 
Yearly  Meeting  produced  its  result. 

There  does  not  seem  to  have  been  any  name  uniformly 
adopted  by  the  Society  in  these  early  days.  It  was 
never  called  a  church,  that  name  being  understood  as 
meaning  a  congregation  of  vitalized  members  only. 
George  Fox  probably  felt  that  he  was  preaching  a  spirit 
which  would  draw  all  men  to  it  ultimately,  and  for  some 
years  did  not  wish  to  think  that  he  was  forming  a  distinct 
organization.  Any  one  who  could  meet  in  reverent 
dependence  upon  God  to  worship  and  receive  gifts  for 
work  was  of  his  denomination.  By  the  time  of  the  settle 
ment  of  Pennsylvania  this  loose  aggregation  of  kindred 
spirits  had  been  outgrown,  and  a  system  was  developed 
which  was  reproduced  in  America.  But  he  had  not  given 
it  a  name.  The  first  Monthly  Meeting  in  Philadelphia 
began  its  minutes,  "  The  Friends  of  God  .  .  .  being  met  in 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       547 

the  fear  and  power  of  the  Lord."  In  future  minutes  they 
call  themselves  "  The  people  of  God,"  "  The  people  of  the 
Lord,"  "  The  people  called  Quakers."  The  latter  was  the 
title  most  frequently  used  in  documents  which  were  to  go 
outside  the  ranks.  They  called  each  other  Friends,  but 
the  term  Society  of  Friends  seems  not  to  have  been 
adopted  as  a  corporate  title  during  colonial  times. 

The  Monthly  Meetings  had  a  source  of  perennial 
labour  in  the  matter  of  marriages.  The  concern  began  in 
the  early  stages.  "  Keeping  company "  with  unsuitable 
persons  (non-Friends)  was  looked  into,  and  parents  who 
did  not  manage  it  properly  were  themselves  objects  of 
meeting  action.  The  parties  most  interested  were  ex 
pected  to  gain  parental  consent,  and  in  some  cases  the 
approval  of  the  meeting,  before  they  made  or  accepted 
final  proposals.  This  being  satisfactorily  arranged,  they 
stood  up  in  meeting  and  each  one  separately  announced 
his  or  her  intention.  This  was  done  twice,  in  some  cases 
thrice,  at  intervals  of  a  month.  Committees  of  men  and 
women  Friends  respectively  were  appointed  to  inquire 
into  the  "  clearness  from  similar  engagements "  of  their 
member,  and  the  consent  of  parents  was  publicly  given. 
After  this  preliminary  the  meeting  allowed  the  marriage 
to  proceed,  and  appointed  a  committee  to  see  that  it  was 
accomplished  according  to  order,  and  that  the  entertain 
ment  at  the  house  was  simple  and  free  from  excessive 
drinking  and  frivolity. 

The  parties,  flanked  by  the  parents,  then  stood  up  in 
meeting  and  took  each  other  as  man  and  wife.  No  priest 
or  minister  intervened  or  dictated  the  words.  No  ring 
symbolised  the  union.  No  organ  broke  the  quiet  of  the 
occasion.  But  in  the  hush  and  silence  of  a  house  full  of 
worshippers  they  took  each  other  by  the  hand.  In  the 
words  of  a  minute  of  1684,  John  Pemberton  did  openly 
declare  as  follows : 

" { Friends,  you  are  here  witness,  in  the  presence  of  God  and 
this  assembly  of  His  people,  I  take  this  maid,  Margaret  Matthews, 
to  be  my  loving  and  lawful  wife,  promising  to  be  a  true  and 
faithful  husband  unto  her  till  death  shall  us  part.'  And  then 


548    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

and  there  in  the  same  assembly  she,  the  said  Margaret  Matthews, 
did  in  like  manner  declare :  '  Friends,  before  God  and  you  His 
people,  I  take  John  Pemberton  to  be  my  husband,  promising  to 
be  a  loving  and  faithful  wife  until  death  shall  us  part.'" 

After  this  open  declaration  to  the  world  a  certificate 
was  produced,  which  the  contracting  parties  signed,  and 
also  many  of  the  spectators  as  witnesses. 

Such  contracts,  gone  into  with  caution  and  the  advice 
of  Friends,  and  ofttimes  with  a  sincere  desire  to  know 
and  do  God's  will,  were  seldom  broken.  The  need  of 
greater  care  and  publicity  was  felt  because  the  Quaker 
form  of  marriage  was  specially  allowed  by  English  law 
and  must  be  above  suspicion.  The  form  and  method, 
though  with  slight  variation  in  the  words,  have  always 
been  used  in  marriages  of  Friends.  It  was  a  binding  and 
religious  contract,  in  which  a  testimony  was  borne  against 
the  need  of  any  priestly  intervention,  but  in  which,  in  the 
presence  of  God  with  men  as  witnesses,  the  man  and 
maiden  took  their  irrevocable  vow. 

The  care  of  the  Meeting  extended  itself  to  the  bride's 
house.  Simplicity  was  expected  in  the  entertainment  of 
the  guests,  and  very  small  details  were  attended  to.  Thus 
in  1773  everything  was  reported  to  the  Meeting  as  satis 
factory  at  one  of  the  weddings  except  that  the  groom 
"  had  assistance  in  taking  off  his  gloves."  In  others  the 
hats  were  not  worn  in  the  meeting-house,  and  many 
superfluities  of  apparel  were  commented  on  unfavourably. 

While  the  duty  of  meeting  attendance  was  urgently 
pressed,  it  was  also  recognised  that  it  must  be  adjusted 
to  other  duties  to  the  state  and  to  society.  The  "  Court," 
an  organisation  of  "  Peacemakers "  to  adjust  civil 
differences  by  equity,  was  in  early  days  composed  of  the 
same  men  who  guided  ecclesiastical  affairs,  and  religious 
appointments  were  often  changed  to  avoid  conflicts  of 
date.  In  1687  the  Monthly  Meetings  which  constituted 
Bucks  Quarterly  Meeting  deferred  the  meeting  because 
"next  Quarterly  Meeting  and  the  Philadelphia  Fair  fall 
both  on  the  same  day."  And  a  few  years  later  a  Monthly 
Meeting  in  Chester  County  adjourned  because  "  the  greater 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       549 

part  of  the  members  of  this  meeting  are  called  away  upon 
a  business  relating  to  government." 

William  Penn  had  placed  upon  Friends  the  duty  of 
working  out  the  adaptability  of  Quaker  principles  to 
government.  In  these  early  days  the  responsibility  was 
upon  them.  It  was  a  sacred  obligation  just  as  much  so 
as  worship.  The  line  between  the  secular  and  the 
religious  was  not  closely  drawn,  but  all  duty  was 
compelling,  and  Friends  were  used  to  approach  a  political 
problem  with  the  same  regard  for  inward  promptings 
towards  righteousness  as  in  their  religious  meetings.  The 
difference  was  rather  one  of  the  degree  of  attention  to 
be  paid  to  these  promptings.  In  meeting  they  would  not 
speak  at  all  without  them.  In  public  affairs,  if  they 
were  absent  they  did  the  best  they  could  ;  but  in  all 
cases  Whittier's  characterisation  is  not  far  wide  of  the 
mark  : 

"  The  presence  of  the  wrong  or  right 
They  rather  felt  than  saw." 

The  Friendly  Legislatures  of  early  days  began  their 
sessions  with  a  period  of  devotional  silence  after  their 
manner  of  worship,  and  all  activities  were  carried  on  in 
the  same  spirit. 

This  identification  of  varied  duties  seemed,  however, 
to  grow  less  pronounced  as  time  advanced.  Secular 
interests  were  made  to  yield  to  religious.  The  demand 
to  drop  everything  else  at  the  regular  time  of  meeting 
became  more  imperious,  and  the  decisions  of  the  church 
as  to  a  man's  outward  activities  more  binding. 

The  public  meetings  themselves  from  a  miscellaneous 
assemblage  became  better  organised.  A  minute  of  1699 
contains  these  explicit  directions  : 

"The  meeting  having  under  consideration  the  indecent 
sitting  and  settling  of  our  meetings,  doth  order,  that  public 
Friends  do  sit  in  the  galleries,  and  the  elder  Friends  with  them, 
or  before  the  galleries;  and  that  our  women  Friends  take  one 
side  of  the  house,  and  the  men  the  other ;  and  that  all  sit  with 
their  faces  towards  the  galleries ;  and  that  the  meeting  be  kept 
below,  and  a  fire  made  above,  for  such  as  are  weak  through 


550    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

sickness,  or  age,  or  otherwise,  to  warm  at,  and  come  down 
again  modestly;  and  keep  the  meeting  soberly,  without  going 
out  any  more  than  necessity  requires."  l 

This  arrangement  dictated  a  special  style  of  archi 
tecture,  and  the  type  is  readily  recognised  down  to  the 
present  day.  The  description,  except  as  to  the  fire,  will 
apply  to  the  internal  arrangements  of  the  houses  for  two 
centuries  following. 

The  subordination  of  the  Quarterly  to  the  Yearly,  of 
the  Monthly  to  the  Quarterly,  and  of  the  Preparative  to 
the  Monthly  Meeting  was  fully  recognised  by  a  minute  of 
1719,  and  the  machinery  was  rapidly  developed.  But  the 
old  spirit  of  personal  worship  was  diligently  cherished.  In 
all  churchly  affairs  even  relating  to  ordinary  business  the 
same  reverent  introversive  attitude  was  the  standard  of 
the  Meeting.  "  Advised  that  Friends  keep  all  your  meet 
ings  in  the  wisdom  of  God  and  unity  of  His  blessed 
Spirit  wherein  they  were  created  and  settled.  .  .  .  Keep 
all  contentions,  reflections,  and  smitings  out  of  your 
meetings  ;  and  keep  down  and  out  all  heats  and  passions 
and  doubtful  disputations  .  .  .  that  they  may  be  managed 
in  the  peaceable  tender  spirit  and  wisdom  of  Jesus 
Christ  with  decency,  forbearance,  care  and  charity  towards 
each  other,"  said  they  in  1721. 

Out  of  this  attitude  grew  naturally  the  Friendly 
method  of  reaching  decisions.  When  Friends  were 
"  gathered  inward  to  the  divine  principle  to  know  from 
what  spring  and  motive  you  act," 2  if  this  divine  principle 
working  in  responsive  hearts  were  a  reality,  it  would  be 
a  most  potent  factor  in  producing  unanimity.  Hence 
voting  and  parliamentary  law  would  be  out  of  place. 
A  quiet  religious  discussion  and  much  feeling  after  the 
truth  and  the  right  would  bring  discordant  views  into 
harmony.  When  this  result  was  reached  the  clerk,  who 
was  supposed  to  have  spiritual  discernment  as  well  as 
clerical  skill,  would  make  a  minute  expressing  the  decision 
holding  it  open  till  the  Meeting  decided  upon  its  fairness 


1  Middletown  Monthly  Meeting. 
*  Yearly  Meeting  Minutes  of  1765. 


CH.  vin  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       551 

and  validity.  It  was  often  a  slow  proceeding,  and 
probably  worked  in  the  interests  of  conservatism  within 
the  body,  though,  as  we  have  seen  in  matters  of  moral 
reform,  Friends  were  not  conservative.  But  it  worked  for 
two  centuries,  and  even  now  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting 
has  no  disposition  to  change  it.  Such  decisions  are  not 
infallible.  Prejudice  and  unreason  and  narrow  concep 
tions  are  not  so  easily  expelled.  With  bitter  partisan  feel 
ing  and  selfish  ends  and  unscrupulous  methods  the  system 
would  break  down.  But  the  advantage  of  it  was  that  these 
ignoble  impulses  would  go  to  the  rear,  along  with  noisy 
oratory  and  political  appeal.  The  eloquence  which  would 
prevail  in  a  Meeting  would  be  a  quiet  feeling  statement 
of  truths  and  principles.  It  is  doubtful  whether  a  more 
wise  and  just  series  of  decisions  extending  over  so  long 
a  time  have  been  reached  otherwise. 

The  decisions  of  the  Meetings  with  regard  to  general 
policy  were  usually  initiated  in  some  progressive  Monthly 
Meeting.  This  went  as  a  request  for  advice  or  direction 
up  through  the  Quarterly  to  the  Yearly  Meeting,  which 
legislated  upon  it,  and  sent  down  the  result  through  the 
same  channel,  for  definite  action.  The  Monthly  Meetings 
for  practical  purposes  thus  became  the  originating  and 
executive  bodies.  They  came  in  contact  with  the  in 
dividuals,  and  had  power  to  receive  and  disown  members 
as  well  as  insist  on  certain  standards  of  living.  These 
functions  were  usually  performed  with  great  forbearance 
and  caution.  There  was  no  effort  to  induce  men  and 
women  to  join  till  they  were  sure  that  their  real 
church  sympathies  would  be  satisfied  by  the  beliefs  and 
customs  of  the  body,  and  till  the  Meeting  was  satisfied 
that  their  convincement  was  genuine.  Numbers  never 
counted  as  such.  The  disownments,  not  only  for  moral 
weakness,  but  for  disregard  of  advice  as  to  plain  living, 
to  meeting  attendance,  to  the  form  of  marriage,  were 
rigidly  administered  in  all  cases  where  repentance  was 
not  forthcoming. 

It  became  customary,  in  the  case  of  any  offender  who 
wished  to  remain  in  membership,  to  require  a  written 


552    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  v 

acknowledgment  of  error,  and  a  recognition  of  the 
wisdom  of  the  regulations  which  he  had  violated.  This 
was  read,  not  only  in  the  Monthly  Meeting,  but,  to  make 
it  absolutely  public,  in  the  First-day  morning  meeting, 
and  in  early  times  also  before  the  "  Court "  (a  secular  body), 
after  which  it  was  posted  on  the  door  of  the  meeting 
house  for  days.  As  cases  of  serious  moral  delinquency 
both  of  men  and  women  were  dealt  with  in  this  public 
way,  many  preferred  to  take  the  milder  penalty  of  dis- 
ownment,  which  cut  them  off  from  church  membership, 
and  such  losses  were  counted  by  the  hundreds  or 
thousands.  That  standards  must  be  maintained,  however 
individuals  suffered,  was  the  unflinching  rule. 

Did  two  Friends  have  a  difference  developing  into 
contention  for  rights  ?  They  were  forbidden  to  go  to 
law  until  everything  else  failed ;  but  the  overseers  or  a 
special  committee  of  the  Monthly  Meeting  would  hear  the 
case  and  make  the  award,  and  the  whole  power  of  the 
Society  was  behind  its  acceptance.  Was  it  reported  that 
a  man  was  taking  risks  in  business  which  would  imperil 
his  creditors  if  everything  did  not  go  smoothly  ?  He  was 
warned  and  almost  ordered  to  protect  the  innocent  before 
extending  his  operations.  Was  a  young  person  evidently 
attracted  by  the  charms  of  some  non- Friend  of  the 
opposite  sex  ?  Both  the  parents  and  the  possible  offender 
were  early  advised  of  the  danger  and  warned  to  desist. 
Was  a  Friendly  official  in  a  place  which  required  the 
administration  of  an  oath  or  a  recognition  of  some 
military  act  ?  He  was  urgently  advised  to  resign  rather 
than  compromise  the  principle.  The  good  name  of  the 
Society,  the  honour  of  Truth,  the  bright  record  of  the 
early  days  of  suffering  were  appealed  to,  to  preserve  at 
least  a  remnant  true  to  the  purest  conceptions  of  right 
and  duty. 

We  may  have  differing  opinions  as  to  whether  the 
rigid  discipline  and  final  disownment  of  offenders  were 
wise  or  not,  but  we  can  hardly  withhold  our  approval  of 
the  kindly  and  effective  treatment  of  their  own  poor, 
extending  into  careful  scrutiny  and  intelligent  detail. 


CH.  vni  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       553 

A  man  in  the  country  through  sickness  is  reduced  to 
want ;  the  Monthly  Meeting  gives  or  lends  him  a  cow. 
Another  is  unable  to  harvest  his  crops  ;  his  neighbours 
do  it  for  him,  or  failing  this,  the  Monthly  Meeting  hires 
the  necessary  labour.  Another  needs  clothing ;  the 
Monthly  Meeting  specifies  the  garments  to  be  procured, 
and  pays  the  bill.  The  doctor's  charges  for  another  are 
paid.  Another  needs  a  house ;  the  Monthly  Meeting 
orders  it  to  be  built  and  assumes  the  debt.  Another  is 
old  and  unable  to  care  for  himself ;  the  Monthly  Meeting 
finds  him  a  boarding-place  and  pays  the  board. 

These  are  all  real  cases  taken  from  the  minutes,  and 
typical  of  hundreds  of  others.  No  Friend  in  want  was 
allowed  to  suffer  or  seek  help  elsewhere  than  from  the 
Meeting.  The  sense  of  fraternity  was  very  strong. 

Nor  was  the  aid  confined  to  their  own  members.  In 
1697  a  general  subscription  was  taken  up  for  "Friends 
and  others"  who  were  suffering  from  Indian  raids  in 
New  England,  which  was  repeated  in  the  early  days  of 
the  Revolution  before  the  war  had  migrated  to  the  South. 
In  1710  there  was  a  general  subscription  to  build  a 
meeting-house  in  Boston.  A  century  later  there  was  a 
failure  of  crops  in  England  and  Ireland,  and  a  sum  of 
about  £6000  went  from  Philadelphia  to  relieve  the 
situation.  In  1725  another  subscription  went  to  New 
England  to  aid  Friends  carried  away  by  the  Indians. 
In  1741  a  letter  of  the  Governor  of  South  Carolina  to 
the  Pennsylvania  proprietor  was  read  in  the  meetings 
asking  aid  to  recover  from  a  fire  at  Charleston,  which 
met  with  a  response.  During  the  days  of  the  Indian 
raids  upon  the  Pennsylvania  frontiers  following  1755, 
large  subscriptions  were  made  in  the  meetings  for  the 
white  sufferers  and  to  buy  Indian  peace. 

A  function  which  had  absorbed  much  of  the  thought 
and  labour  of  English  Friends  had  been  the  collection 
and  tabulation  of  statistics  concerning  the  suffering  of 
Friends  for  conscience*  sake  by  fines  and  imprisonment. 
From  this  duty,  for  a  long  time,  the  Pennsylvania  Friends 
were  relieved.  For  freedom  of  conscience,  and  especially 


554    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

of  the  Quaker  conscience,  was  a  cherished  principle  of 
Penn's  province.  There  were  some  distraints  for  tithes 
in  neighbouring  provinces  where  members  of  Philadelphia 
Yearly  Meeting  lived,  and  these  were  regularly  reported 
by  the  Quarterly  Meetings.  But  a  "  Meeting  for  Suffer 
ings  "  seemed  to  have  little  place. 

When,  however,  in  1755  the  Indian  Wars  broke  out, 
and  there  seemed  a  likelihood  of  privations  for  the  Friends 
who  lived  on  the  frontiers,  the  Yearly  Meeting  directed  a 
subscription  of  £1000  to  be  raised  to  meet  the  foreseen 
contingency.  To  distribute  this  it  was  proposed  to 
appoint  a  committee  consisting  of  twelve  Friends  of 
Philadelphia  and  four  of  each  of  the  other  Quarterly 
Meetings,  appointed  by  them  respectively,  who  should 
investigate  all  cases  of  suffering  and  administer  relief. 
This  temporary  need  was  the  origin  of  the  Philadelphia 
Meeting  for  Sufferings,  a  body  of  great  import  in  the 
subsequent  history  of  Friends.  Following  the  example 
of  the  English  counterpart,  it  was  to  have  larger  powers 
than  its  name  would  indicate.  It  was 

"...  to  represent  this  meeting  and  appear  in  all  cases  where 
the  reputation  of  Truth  and  our  religious  Society  are  concerned ; 
provided  that  they  do  not  meddle  with  matters  of  faith  or 
discipline  not  already  determined  in  this  meeting ;  and  that  at 
least  twelve  should  concur  on  all  occasions ;  and  that  in  matters 
of  great  importance,  notice  be  given  or  sent  to  all  members  of 
the  Committee." 

Subsequent  minutes  directed  them  to  have  their 
minutes  read  in  the  Yearly  Meeting ;  committed  to  them 
the  proper  administration  of  all  legacies  and  trusts 
belonging  to  the  Yearly  Meeting ;  still  later  the  work 
of  the  Overseers  of  the  Press  was  also  given  them.  In 
short  they  were  made  the  Executive  Committee  of  the 
Yearly  Meeting  with  large  jurisdiction.  At  first  they 
were  appointed  from  year  to  year,  but  in  1768  they 
were  made  a  permanent  body. 

This  meeting  in  time,  by  virtue  of  the  strength  of  the 
men  composing  it,  and  their  long  continuance  in  office, 
became  a  most  influential  body — the  inner  circle  of  leaders. 


CH.  viii  GENERAL  CONDITIONS,   1700-1775       555 

Its  ascendency  was  exerted  in  all  times  of  stress,  and 
being  free  from  control  between  the  sessions,  and  having 
large  influence  during  them,  it  was  able  for  the  succeeding 
century  largely  to  govern  the  destinies  of  the  Yearly 
Meeting,  strengthening  at  all  times  the  tendencies  towards 
conservatism. 


CHAPTER    IX 

THE    FRIENDS    IN    THE    REVOLUTION 

THE  Friends  approached  the  Revolutionary  War  shorn 
of  some  of  their  political  power,  but  still  a  strong  factor 
in  public  affairs.  The  rift  between  the  ecclesiastical 
Quakers  and  the  political  Quakers  which  showed  itself 
first  about  1755  had  been  widening  since.  There  were, 
in  Philadelphia  especially,  a  large  number  of  Friends 
who  had  adopted  the  principles  of  James  Logan,  that 
offensive  war  was  never  to  be  considered,  but  that  a 
war  of  defence  was  Christian  and  therefore  justifiable. 
When  that  veteran,  after  nearly  fifty  years  of  conspicuous 
service  in  the  State,  proposed  this  doctrine  to  the  Yearly 
Meeting,  and  intimated  that  any  one  who  did  not  believe 
in  it  was  hardly  fitted  to  serve  in  the  Legislature,  he 
seemed  to  have  no  following.  The  one  Friend  who 
stood  up  to  support  his  cause  was  plucked  down  by  the 
coat-tail  with  the  remark,  "  Sit  thee  down,  Robert,  thou  art 
single  [alone]  in  the  matter."  His  paper  was  not  even 
read.  But  James  Logan,  while  deservedly  honoured  as  a 
scholar  and  as  a  statesman,  was  never  an  authority  in 
the  affairs  of  his  church.  He  gave  his  money  to  establish 
lotteries  in  the  public  interests.  He  supported  Franklin 
in  his  aid  to  military  expeditions.  He  was  a  member 
of  the  Council  and  a  confidential  adviser  of  Thomas 
Penn  when  the  alienation  of  the  Delaware  Indians  was 
caused  by  ill-treatment ;  and  though  himself  not  responsible 
for  this,  there  was  evidently  no  great  sympathy  between 
him  and  the  Friends  who  later  formed  the  Friendly 
Association. 

556 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION         557 

But  while  not  influential  in  the  Yearly  Meeting,  he 
evidently  had  a  large  following  among  the  young  Friends 
of  the  more  prominent  families  of  the  city.  It  was  these 
that  constituted  the  members  of  the  fire  company  who 
proposed  to  buy  a  great  gun  for  the  protection  of  the 
city  under  the  name  of  a  fire-engine,1  who  absented 
themselves  when  the  question  of  military  defence  was  to 
be  voted  on,  because,  while  they  approved  of  it,  they 
did  not  wish  to  bring  themselves  under  the  censure  of 
their  Meetings.  It  was  these  also  who  rushed  to  arms 
on  the  stormy  February  days  of  1764,  when  the  "  Paxton 
Boys  "  were  encamped  in  Germantown,  and  who  were  the 
objects,  in  most  cases  the  unsuccessful  objects,  of  the 
labours  of  the  Monthly  Meeting  for  years  to  come.  It 
was  these  who,  against  the  urgent  and  oft-repeated  advice 
of  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings  and  the  Yearly  Meeting, 
maintained  the  interest  in  politics  that  kept,  not  Quakers, 
but,  as  their  enemies  said,  "  Quakerized "  members  of 
other  bodies,  in  the  prominent  places  in  the  government, 
a  policy  which,  while  not  bringing  upon  themselves  direct 
censure,  was  a  cause  of  much  concern  to  the  worthy 
leaders  of  the  Yearly  Meeting.  It  was  these  also  who, 
after  the  death  of  John  Kinsey  in  1750,  ranged  them 
selves  under  the  banner  of  Isaac  Norris  2nd,  a  Friend 
of  the  Logan  type,  and  Benjamin  Franklin,  and  fought 
at  the  polls  and  in  the  Legislature  the  battles  of  freedom 
against  proprietor  and  crown,  yet  so  conservatively  and 
skilfully  that  Pennsylvania  never  drew  upon  herself  the 
penalties  which  the  greater  audacity  of  Boston  had  to 
suffer. 

There  is  no  reason  to  believe  that,  prior  to  the 
Revolution,  more  than  a  few  of  the  Friends  felt  that 
their  political  days  were  for  ever  ended.  The  wars  of 
1756  made  it  impossible  for  them  to  support  the  policy 
of  the  executive.  The  threat  of  an  enforced  oath  sent 
over  from  England,  for  ever  excluding  the  Friends  of 
all  the  colonies  from  participation  in  government,  they 
avoided  by  an  agreement  to  decline  places  in  the  Assembly. 

1  Franklin's  Autobiography. 


558    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES  BK.  v 

But  they  felt  that  this  sacrifice  was  but  temporary,  and 
that  the  days  to  come  might  be  a  duplicate  of  those 
prior  to  1750  when  they  managed  the  most  prosperous, 
the  most  peaceful,  the  most  progressive  province  along 
the  Atlantic  coast -line.  The  people  were  still  with 
them.  More  than  once  the  Yearly  Meeting  had  to 
sound  a  note  of  alarm  lest  Friends  should  regain  their 
ascendency  in  the  Legislature.  James  Pemberton  of  the 
straitest  sect  apologised  for  allowing  himself  to  be  elected 
because  by  this  he  could  keep  a  worse  man  out.  The 
political  Quaker  was  dying  hard,  and  was  never  beyond 
the  hope  of  resurrection.  When  John  Adams  came 
down  to  the  first  Continental  Congress  he  found  the 
Quaker  influence  in  politics  and  at  the  dinner -table 
almost  too  strong  to  be  resisted. 

The  country  Friends  probably  did  not  draw  the  lines 
so  clearly.  They  had  complete  control  over  the  local 
offices,  and  these  were  not  affected  by  war  and  oaths. 
They  were  not  in  touch,  as  were  their  city  brethren,  with 
the  greater  problems  of  the  day,  and  were  more  inclined 
to  accept  the  traditional  unwarlike  policy  of  the  early 
Friends.  Hence,  when  the  war  actually  broke  out,  we 
find  that  among  those  who  definitely  espoused  the 
American  side  in  the  city  were  such  representative  names 
as  Biddle,  Marshall,  Matlack,  Mifflm,  Morris,  Wetherill, 
and  Wharton,  while  those  dealt  with  as  offenders  in  the 
country  were  often  such  as  had  little  vital  relationship 
to  the  Meetings. 

The  Friends  approached  the  Revolution  as  a  whole 
with  a  very  meagre  education.  There  was  none  of  the 
illiteracy  of  many  of  the  Germans  and  Scotch  Irishmen 
of  the  middle  and  western  belts,  but  there  was  very  little 
of  the  possession  of  the  belief  in  real  scholarship.  Yet 
they  had  a  nucleus  of  it  in  the  isolated  self-educated 
country  Friends  and  the  circle  of  moderate  wealth  and 
culture  in  the  city,  which  read  widely  and  with  discrimina 
tion  the  literature  of  the  ancients  and  of  England. 
Unfortunately  for  the  Society  much  of  this  circle,  following 
Logan  in  his  scholarly  interests,  was  also  of  the  group 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS   IN  THE  REVOLUTION         559 

that  followed  him  in  their  attitude  to  military  defence. 
Their  Quaker  impulses  kept  them  true  to  the  cause  of 
liberty.  Their  knowledge  of  affairs  made  them  see  the 
strength  of  the  American  policy  of  resistance.  Their  past 
leadership  and  broad  training  gave  them  a  prominent 
place  in  the  excitements  that  preceded  the  outbreak  of 
war.  It  was  perfectly  natural  that  their  mental  grasp  of 
problems  should  have  drawn  them  by  insensible  degrees 
not  only  into  participation  in,  but  also  into  logical 
leadership  of  the  movement,  which,  unknown  to  them  for 
a  long  time,  was  carrying  the  united  colonies  into  the 
support  of  Boston  and  into  war  and  independence. 

The  attitude  of  Friends  cannot  be  well  understood 
without  a  reference  to  John  Dickinson.  He  was  probably 
not  a  member,  though  why  he  was  not  it  is  difficult  to 
explain.  His  ancestors  were  Friends  for  several  generations. 
His  wife  and  children  were  Friends,  and  he  himself  in 
later  life  was  identified  with  Friends,  used  their  language 
and  customs,  and  was  so  considered  by  his  acquaintances. 
But  he  was  not  married  by  Friends  regulations,  and  he 
was  for  a  time  a  soldier  in  the  Revolutionary  army. 
There  seems  no  record  of  his  disownment,  which  is 
explained  by  some  historians  by  the  statement  that  he 
was  too  important  a  man  for  such  peremptory  proceedings, 
an  explanation  which  any  one  who  knows  the  temper  of 
the  Quakerism  of  the  times  will  recognise  as  inadmissible. 

There  is  much  in  his  conservative  attitude  to  point  to 
his  Friendly  habit  of  thought.  Up  to  the  memorable 
Fourth  of  July  he  was  a  leader  of  leaders.  His  Farmer's 
Letters  of  1768  gave  the  legal  and  historic  basis  for 
American  claims.  He  was  better  known  across  the 
water  during  these  pre-Revolutionary  days  than  any  other 
American.  He  wrote  nearly  every  important  state  paper — 
the  appeals  to  the  King  and  English  people,  the  Declara 
tion  of  Rights,  Articles  of  Confederation,  both  the  argument 
to  convince  and  the  passionate  oratory  and  poetry  to 
inflame  the  American  mind — up  to  the  date  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence.  Here  he  halted,  and  the 
movement  swept  by  him.  He  would  not  sign  the 


560    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

Declaration,  not  that  he  did  not  desire  independence,  but 
that  he  thought  the  occasion  to  be  premature.  He  would 
have  preferred  longer  to  try  the  continuance  of  protest 
and  appeal  to  a  sense  of  justice  in  the  English  people  and 
the  world.  He  would  have  waited  to  take  advantage  of 
a  change  of  English  ministry,  of  the  hundred  ways  of 
solving  a  problem  and  securing  honourable  claims,  of  a 
resistance  stopping  short  of  arms,  instead  of  the  plunge 
into  a  war  which  if  unsuccessful  would  have  left  America 
at  the  mercy  of  English  aggression,  and  liberty  only  a 
name  on  either  side  of  the  Atlantic.  Who  will  now  say 
that  if  the  American  statesmen  of  his  day  had  been  all  of 
his  mind  all  that  we  secured  by  war  could  not  have  been 
secured  by  diplomacy  and  the  bitter  memories  which  lasted 
a  century  have  been  avoided?  His  life  was  typical  of 
Quaker  influence — potent  to  the  very  outbreak  of  war, 
suddenly  and  strikingly  impotent  after  it  becomes  a  fact. 

The  more  consistent  Friends,  who  ruled  the  deliberations 
of  the  Meeting,  saw  the  storm  coming  and  began  to  put 
up  the  defences.  Many  of  them  had  been  the  leading 
merchants  of  Philadelphia,  and  the  Navigation  Acts  had 
struck  them  heavily.  For  they  were  not  only  limited  in 
their  trade  to  English  ships  and  English  countries,  but  the 
stringent  query  which  every  Monthly  Meeting  had  to 
answer  "  Are  Friends  careful  not  to  defraud  the  King  of 
his  dues?"  must  be  answered  in  the  negative,  and  so  the 
favourite  resort  of  the  multitude,  smuggling,  was  denied 
them.  These  merchants  joined  heartily  in  all  the  pre 
liminary  measures  of  resistance.  Some  fifty  of  them, 
including  the  Pembertons  and  Whartons,  signed  the  non 
importation  agreement  to  defeat  the  Stamp  Act  of  1765, 
and  wrote  to  London  Friends  explaining  and  defending  their 
position.  This  passive  resistance  suited  their  principles, 
but  they  would  not  join  in  the  forcible  ejectment  of  the 
King's  officers.  In  that  year  James  Pemberton  was 
elected  to  the  Assembly  on  the  basis  of  the  temperate 
measures  the  Friends  proposed,  defeating  the  more  radical 
candidate. 

The  Stamp  Act  was  repealed.     Among  the  exuberant 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION         561 

expressions  of  triumph,  the  bonfires,  and  burning  of  effigies 
by  which  the  repeal  was  celebrated  in  Boston  and  New 
York,  Philadelphia  through  Quaker  influence  sent  a 
dignified  declaration  of  appreciation  to  the  King.  Franklin 
lent  his  aid  in  these  moderate  endeavours. 

So  matters  went  on  till  1773,  when  the  attempt  to 
force  tea  upon  the  colonies  precipitated  the  historic  act  in 
Boston  harbour. 

The  consignees  of  the  tea  in  Philadelphia  were  two 
Quaker  firms,  T.  &  I.  Wharton  and  James  &  Drinker. 
A  meeting  of  citizens  had  decreed  that  the  tea  should  not 
be  landed.  The  Whartons  were  quite  willing  to  join  with 
this  movement,  and  James  &  Drinker  seem  to  have  been 
forced  into  it  by  public  sentiment.  The  results  were 
satisfactory,  for  the  vessel  was  not  allowed  to  unload  any 
of  its  cargo,  but  was  sent  back,  the  consignees  loaning 
the  captain  enough  money  to  see  him  through. 

The  next  step  in  the  drama  was  the  visit  of  Paul 
Revere  to  secure  the  sympathy  of  Philadelphia  for  the 
suffering  Patriots  of  Boston.  The  allies  with  whom  he 
worked  were  closely  associated  with  Friends.  First  of  all 
must  be  secured  John  Dickinson,  then  trusted  by  everybody. 
Charles  Thomson,  not  a  Friend,  but  late  master  of  the 
Friends'  School  and  the  faithful  clerk  of  Tedyuscung, 
was  a  most  efficient  aid,  as  also  was  Thomas  Miffiin,  a 
well-to-do  Quaker  merchant  of  Philadelphia,  with  a 
distinguished  career  as  General  in  the  army  and  Governor 
of  the  State  ahead  of  him.  These  three  men,  representing 
the  more  militant  Friendly  influence  of  the  city  carried 
the  day  and  sent  a  sympathetic  message  to  Boston,  which 
gave  the  harassed  citizens  there  great  encouragement  and 
opened  the  way  for  the  first  Continental  Congress  in  1774. 

These  three  men  represented  not  only  the  more  ardent 
members  of  the  Quaker  fold,  but  at  first  that  larger  class 
who  since  1756  had  governed  the  Colony  through  the 
Legislature,  not  Friends  but  in  all  but  non-resistance 
perfectly  sympathetic  with  Quaker  policy — a  conservative, 
liberty-loving,  progressive  people  who  would  have  gone  to 
any  length  save  independence  and  war  to  secure  American 

2  O 


562    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

freedom  of  trade  and  taxation  and  local  self-government. 
Had  the  movement  been  left  with  Thomson,  the  shrewdest 
of  the  three,  it  is  not  improbable  that  he  would  have 
brought  these  moderates  into  line,  and  made  the  course  of 
revolution  in  Pennsylvania  easy  and  possibly  pacific.  But 
the  fiery  Presbyterians  could  not  be  restrained,  and  much 
of  this  non-Quaker  conservatism  went  over  to  "  loyalty," 
and  for  a  time  the  issue  was  doubtful.  In  the  meantime 
the  real  Friendly  forces  were  getting  into  line.  War  was 
in  the  foreground  if  not  actually  here.  Independence  was 
being  uttered,  as  yet  but  under  the  breath.  The  beneficent 
charter  of  Penn  of  1 70 1 ,  working  for  just  seventy-five  years, 
was  cast  incontinently  aside,  against  the  advice  of  Dickinson, 
Thomson,  and  Mifflin,  and  with  the  aid  of  Franklin,  who 
had  now  joined  the  Radicals,  in  1776  a  new  revolutionary 
government  was  effected. 

The  Friends  had  a  testimony  not  only  against  war, 
but,  which  is  harder  to  explain  logically,  against  revolution. 
It  probably  grew  up  in  this  way. 

In  the  troubled  days  of  England  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  there  was  a  continued  series  of  plots  and  counter 
plots,  some  for  worthy  and  some  for  unworthy  purposes. 
All  movements  were  suspected  as  covering  some  traitorous 
design,  and  Friends  did  not  escape  these  suspicions.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  they  were  living  in  the  serene  atmosphere 
of  spiritual  experiences  which  forbade  all  participation  in 
such  underhand  and  questionable  designs.  Their  leaders 
were  continually  urging  them  to  keep  clear  of  all  com 
motions  and  intrigues  of  the  time,  and  there  grew  up  in 
the  consciousness  of  English  Quakerism  a  belief  that 
obedience  to  the  powers  that  were,  whenever  that  obedience 
did  not  trench  on  conscience,  was  a  fundamental  duty  of 
the  citizen.  This  consciousness,  doubtless  much  weakened 
by  the  decades  of  successful  government  of  Pennsylvania, 
now  responded  to  the  new  conditions.  When  the  Friends 
saw  the  plotting  of  the  leaders  tending  to  weaken  the 
hold  of  the  crown  of  England  upon  the  colonies,  the 
eager  following  of  a  class  of  people,  always  their  political 
opponents,  who  had  embroiled  them  in  Indian  wars,  and 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION         563 

who  were  associated  in  their  minds  with  the  narrow  policy 
of  early  New  England,  they  brought  to  light  again  the 
advice  of  George  Fox  of  1685  : 

"  Whatever  bustlings  or  troubles  or  tumults  or  outrages  should 
rise  in  the  world  keep  out  of  them;  but  keep  in  the  Lords 
power  and  in  the  peaceable  truth  that  is  over  all,  in  which  power 
you  seek  the  peace  and  good  of  all  men,  and  live  in  the  love 
which  God  has  shed  abroad  in  your  hearts  through  Jesus  Christ, 
in  which  love  nothing  is  able  to  separate  you  from  God  and 
Christ." 

They  urged  their  members  who  were  in  official  position, 
positively  to  oppose  measures  tending  towards  revolution, 
and  finally  declared  that,  quoting  an  old  Friends'  document 
of  1696: 

"  The  setting  up  and  putting  down  Kings  and  governments 
is  God's  peculiar  prerogative,  for  causes  best  known  to  himself." 

Hereafter  there  was  a  concurrent  testimony  to  be 
borne  against  war  and  against  revolution,  which  placed 
Friends  in  quiet  opposition  to  the  American  cause.  Not 
only  must  they  keep  out  of  martial  operations  but  they 
must  keep  out  of  all  participation  in  the  new  government 
set  up  for  the  purpose  of  independence.  They  would  not 
actively  oppose  it.  Their  place  was  to  be  in  quiet 
attendance  upon  their  private  and  religious  duties  till  the 
storm  was  overpast.  Many  of  them  sympathised  with 
the  American  cause.  Many,  including  the  leading 
Philadelphians,  were  in  their  hearts  Loyalists,  though 
guiltless  of  overt  acts.  All  who  remained  true  to  their 
church  allegiance,  and  they  constituted  the  vast  majority 
everywhere,  were  united  in  a  policy  of  neutrality  for 
conscience'  sake. 

In  an  address  to  the  people  of  America,  dated  First 
Month  2Oth,  1776,  they  strongly  define  their  position, 
and  reiterate  their  loyalty  to  the  King  of  England,  but 
this  was  in  the  early  days  when  even  the  military  associa 
tions  led  by  Anthony  Wayne  vigorously  declared  that 
the  idea  that  they  were  working  for  independence  could 
only  originate  "  among  the  worst  of  men  for  the  worst  of 


564    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

purposes."     A  rapid  change  of  front  of  many  a  Patriot 
took  place  in  the  first  six  months  of  1/76. 

Dr.  Fothergill,  fully  sympathising  with  the  opposition  of 
the  Friends  to  war,  and  urging  them  to  maintain  it  firmly 
and  quietly,  yet  evidently  would  have  them  yield  to  the 
voice  of  America  and  not  oppose  the  general  movement. 
The  cause  of  liberty  in  England,  as  in  America,  was  bound 
up,  he  said,  with  its  success.  It  would  have  saved  them 
much  trouble  and  some  indefensible  positions  had  they 
heeded  his  advice.  For  their  testimony  against  the  new 
government  made  them  feel  that  they  must  hold  no  office 
under  it,  or  pay  taxes  to  it,  must  not  affirm  allegiance  to 
it,  or  even  handle  its  paper  money.  It  is  difficult  to 
separate  in  a  time  of  war  the  support  due  to  the  usual 
demands  and  needs  of  the  State  from  those  directly  and 
obviously  for  war  purposes,  but  had  they  attempted  to 
make  the  distinction,  as  Dr.  Fothergill  urged,  it  would 
have  set  them  right  not  only  with  their  contemporaries  but 
also  with  many  historians,  in  whose  eyes  a  Quaker  and 
a  Tory  were  synonymous  names.  It  would  have  obviated 
the  necessity  of  meting  out  the  penalties  of  the  discipline 
to  any  but  those  who  had  trangressed  its  peace  pro 
visions.  It  is  probable  that  actual  disownment  was 
reserved  for  these  only,  but  others  were  made  to  feel  that 
they  were  out  of  unity  with  the  body. 

There  was  plenty  for  the  overseers  to  do  in  these  early 
days  of  the  war,  and  there  was  none  of  the  deliberation 
and  leniency  shown  in  1764  to  the  would-be  defenders 
of  the  Indians.  The  integrity  of  Quaker  testimony 
against  war  was  at  stake,  and  gathering  up  all  their 
reserve  of  strength,  and  shutting  their  hearts  against  the 
pleadings  of  mercy  for  their  brothers  and  sons  who  had 
joined  the  "  associators "  or  paid  war  taxes,  or  placed 
guns  for  defence  upon  their  vessels,  or  paid  fines  in  lieu 
of  military  service,  or  paid  fines  for  refusing  to  collect 
military  taxes,  or  in  any  way  aided  the  war  on  either 
side,  they  cleared  the  Society  of  all  open  complicity  with  it. 
The  offence  was  reported  to  one  Monthly  Meeting,  and 
at  the  next  the  testimony  of  disownment  would  go  out. 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION         565 

One  of  the  first  to  go  was  Thomas  Mifflin,  and  several 
hundreds  of  others  soon  followed.  It  was  in  these  early 
days  of  the  Revolution,  1775  and  1776,  that  the  process 
was  most  vigorously  carried  on,  and  it  seemed  to  halt 
the  tendency  to  warlike  participation.  Not  half-a-dozen 
Friends,  perhaps,  joined  the  British  Army,  while  those 
who  asserted  themselves  in  an  objectionable  way  in  the 
American  cause  numbered  probably  four  or  five  hundred. 

This  was  a  small  proportion  of  the  30,000 
Friends  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  but  contained  some 
valuable  elements  whose  loss  weakened  the  prestige  of 
Quakerism  for  years  to  come.  But  it  need  not  be 
inferred  that  they  were  all  of  this  class.  As  usual  the 
demoralised  elements  of  Society  eagerly  or  weakly  would 
go  into  the  army,  and  the  disownments  drove  from 
Friends  much  that  was  simply  out  of  touch  with  all 
religious  or  moral  principle  as  well  as  those  whose 
patriotism  asserted  itself  in  divergent  views. 

The  Friends  did  not  officially  evade  the  issue.  The 
new  government  founded  on  the  ruins  of  Penn's  charter 
could  hardly  afford  to  ignore  such  a  declaration  as  that 
of  the  Meeting  for  Sufferings  of  Twelfth  Month  2Oth, 
1776: 

"  Thus  we  may  with  Christian  firmness  withstand  and  refuse 
to  submit  to  the  arbitrary  injunctions  and  ordinances  of  men 
who  assume  to  themselves  the  power  of  compelling  others, 
either  in  person  or  by  assistance,  to  join  in  carrying  on  war,  and 
of  prescribing  modes  of  determining  concerning  our  religious 
principles,  by  imposing  tests  not  warranted  by  the  precepts  of 
Christ  or  the  laws  of  the  happy  constitution  under  which  we  and 
others  long  enjoyed  tranquility  and  peace." 

In  1777  the  war  came  into  Pennsylvania.  By  this 
time  the  Friends  were  generally  united  as  to  policy. 
They  would  assist  neither  army.  They  would  allow 
their  goods  to  be  taken  by  foragers  without  resistance,  and 
would  take  no  pay  for  them.  Their  meeting-houses  might 
be  used  for  barracks  or  hospitals,  and  they  would  at  the 
usual  time  meet  elsewhere.  Their  pleasant  farm-houses 
and  well-filled  barns  were  at  the  mercy  of  any  needy 


566    QUAKERS   IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

trooper.  Their  vacated  city  houses  could  be  used  for  the 
sick  and  wounded,  or  the  winter  quarters  of  soldiery. 
They  would  in  the  meantime  quietly  attend  to  their 
business  or  religious  duties  so  far  as  circumstances  would 
permit : 

"On  the  29th  day  of  the  gih  month,  1777,"  says  a  minute 
of  Philadelphia  Monthly  Meeting,  "  being  the  day  in  course  for 
holding  our  monthly  meeting  a  number  of  Friends  met  when  the 
present  situation  of  things  being  considered,  and  it  appearing 
that  the  King's  army  are  near  entering  the  city,  at  which  time 
it  may  be  proper  the  inhabitants  should  generally  be  at  their 
habitations,  in  order  to  preserve  as  much  as  possible  peace  and 
good  order  on  this  solemn  occasion,  it  is  therefore  proposed  to 
adjourn  the  monthly  meeting." 

Thus  was  the  British  army  welcomed  by  Friends  to 
Philadelphia.  "  The  people,"  an  old  account  says, 
"  appeared  sad  and  serious."  If  there  were  any  tendency 
at  the  start  to  look  upon  these  soldiers  of  the  King  as 
liberators,  their  actions  through  that  melancholy  winter 
disabused  Friends'  minds  of  it.  Not  only  was  their  fair 
city,  the  best  built  and  best  kept  in  America,  made 
a  prey  to  the  dirt  and  devastation  of  a  rude  soldiery,  but 
the  revels,  and  gambling,  and  lax  morality  of  the  officers, 
in  which  many  of  the  well-to-do  citizens  joined,  made  it 
difficult  to  maintain  their  old  standards  among  their 
young  men.  That  war  was  an  evil  was  indelibly 
impressed  upon  them. 

But  they  suffered  also  from  the  other  side.  As  the 
army  of  Sir  William  Howe  approached  the  city  from  the 
Chesapeake,  the  Continental  Congress  advised  the  Council 
of  the  State  of  Pennsylvania  to  arrest  and  seize  the 
papers  of  such  citizens  of  Philadelphia  as  were  notoriously 
British  in  their  sympathies.  It  was  specified  that  "  a 
number  of  persons  of  considerable  wealth  who  profess  them 
selves  to  belong  to  the  Society  of  people  called  Quakers 
.  .  .  are  with  much  rancour  and  bitterness  disaffected 
to  the  American  cause "  and  should  be  seized,  and  their 
private  papers  and  minutes  of  their  meetings  searched  for 
evidences  of  their  having  furnished  valuable  information 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS   IN  THE  REVOLUTION         567 

to  the  British.  The  Council  thus  advised  arbitrarily 
made  the  arrest  of  about  forty  people,  many  of  whom 
were  Friends.  They  were  offered  their  liberty  if  they 
would  give  their  word  that  they  would  not  leave  their 
houses.  This  the  Friends  and  a  few  others  refused,  and 
about  twenty  of  them  were  placed  in  confinement.  They 
protested  against  the  arrest  as  an  outrage  and  would 
make  no  promises.  The  list  included  the  Pembertons, 
the  Fishers,  Thomas  Wharton,  Henry  Drinker,  and  others, 
all  prominent  in  the  Meeting.  They  were  sent  to 
Winchester,  Virginia,  and  kept  in  nominal  confinement 
through  the  winter.  Two  of  them,  John  Hunt  and 
Thomas  Gilpin,  died  during  their  stay,  and  Israel 
Pemberton  shortly  after  their  return.  Nothing  in  the 
way  of  communication  with  the  British  was  ever  proved 
against  them  ;  nor,  as  we  well  know  now,  was  there 
anything  except  exhortations  to  faithfulness  and  explana 
tions  of  the  conduct  of  Friends  found  in  the  minutes  of 
their  meetings,  which  were  soon  returned  to  them. 
Nothing  was  gained  for  the  American  cause  by  the 
banishment,  except  possibly  the  quieting  of  some  Tories, 
and  this  is  doubtful.  That  these  Friends  desired  the 
success  of  the  British  is  probable ;  that  they  so  far 
stultified  their  constant  advice  to  keep  out  of  the  contest 
completely,  as  to  give  information  of  either  army  to  the 
other,  is  at  this  distance  incredible.  Meetings  everywhere 
rallied  around  the  exiles,  and  the  incident  undoubtedly 
drew  Friends  together.  They  were  finally  returned 
home,  with  something  of  an  apology  and  a  recognition 
of  their  good  motives.1 

The  retreat  of  the  British  army  in  the  spring  of  1778 
gave  the  city  again  into  the  hands  of  the  Americans. 
The  condition  of  Friends  was  not  much  improved,  for  a 
mob  of  extreme  Revolutionists  obtained  control,  who 
would  have  vengeance  on  all  Tory  sympathisers.  The 
real  Tories  were  out  of  their  reach  in  New  York,  but 
they  hanged  Roberts  and  Carlisle,  both  Friends,  on  the 

1  Thomas  Gilpin,   descendant  of  one  of  the  sufferers,  has  written  a  careful 
account  of  the  whole  affair  under  the  title  Exiles  in  Virginia. 


568    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

charge  of  treason,  on  very  slight  ground.  Moderate  men 
like  Robert  Morris  and  James  Wilson,  and  even  such  an 
ardent  supporter  of  the  American  cause  as  Thomas 
Mifflin,  were  besieged  in  their  houses  and  hardly  escaped. 
The  windows  of  Friends'  houses  were  broken  with  stones 
and  they  hooted  in  the  streets.  They  would  neither 
weep  nor  rejoice  at  the  command  of  the  State,  and  even 
when  the  crowning  victory  of  Yorktown  was  announced, 
"  the  occasion  of  a  victory  of  one  of  the  parties  of  war 
over  the  other,"  as  they  characterised  it  in  their  effort  for 
stern  neutrality,  they  refused  to  illuminate  their  houses, 
and  passed  a  night  of  danger  and  damage. 

Whatever  other  effects  were  produced  upon  their 
minds  there  is  no  doubt  that  they  appreciated  that  a  time 
of  warfare  is  an  unpleasant  time  for  non-combatants. 
It  was  a  favourite  preamble  to  their  resolutions  in  the 
days  when  they  controlled  the  Assembly  : 

"While  we  do  not  as  the  world  is  now  circumstanced 
condemn  the  use  of  arms  in  others,  we  are  principled  against 
bearing  arms  ourselves." 

That  is,  do  as  you  please,  only  do  not  ask  us  to  help  you 
— do  not  allow  any  conscience  to  be  strained.  They 
would  probably  hardly  subscribe  to  this  doctrine  now, 
for  they  would  recognise  that  a  neutral  could  not  be  let 
alone,  however  much  he  might  desire  it.  They  had, 
doubtless,  come  to  the  same  conclusion  as  General 
Sherman  regarding  war,  and  for  the  same  reason,  because 
they  had  seen  it ;  though  their  characterisation  was  not 
so  trenchant  and  effective. 

The  aggregate  of  Quaker  suffering  was  very  great. 
The  Meetings  kept  actual  records  and  detailed  estimates 
of  the  losses  by  fines  and  distraints  and  foraging  parties. 
These  losses  continued  for  some  time  after  the  war  was 
over,  probably  till  about  1787.  In  general  they  would 
not  pay  the  fines,  for  this  would  recognise  a  government 
based  on  war  and  revolution.  Distraint  would  follow, 
always  a  costly  expedient.  Possibly  the  total  direct  loss 
of  property  to  members  would  not  fall  short  of  £50,000. 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION         569 

Personal  unpopularity  was  even  harder  to  stand,  and 
cases  of  imprisonment  were  not  rare.  Six  Friends  were 
kept  in  Lancaster  jail  for  months,  because  they  would 
not  take  a  test  of  allegiance  to  the  new  government, 
and  when  they  might  have  been  released  they  refused 
to  pay  the  jailer's  fees,  on  the  logical  ground  that  they 
did  not  choose  the  imprisonment  for  themselves,  and 
should  not  pay  for  it.  School  teachers  were  required 
to  take  the  test  There  were  then  a  number  of  Friends' 
schools  and  teachers.  Some  closed  the  schools,  and  some 
took  the  consequences.  As  is  always  the  case  with  this 
class  they  had  no  money,  and  so  jailing  was  the  only 
satisfaction  the  State  got.  Friends  were  elected  to  offices, 
as  tax  collectors,  which  it  was  known  that  they  would  not 
fill,  then  fined  for  non-compliance.  Friends  were  advised 
by  the  Meetings  not  to  furnish  supplies,  grind  grain,  or 
make  weapons  for  the  army  for  money,  or  allow  their 
goods  to  be  transported  in  armed  vessels. 

Moses  Roberts  and  his  friends  of  Catawissa,  then  a 
frontier  town,  who  had  always  been  safe  among  the 
Indians,  were  arrested  on  the  way  to  meeting,  sent  to 
Lancaster  jail  in  a  canoe,  and  kept  there  for  months 
without  trial.  Their  families  were  driven  from  their 
homes  without  any  means  of  support,  and  their  property 
seized.  Other  frontier  Friends  suffered  greatly  on  the 
charge  that  they  gave  information  to  hostile  Indians. 

The  Meeting  for  Sufferings  did  not  cease  to  protest 
against  these  persecutions.  The  change  from  the  day 
when  they  ruled  the  Quaker  Commonwealth  by  the 
suffrages  of  all  kinds  of  citizens  to  the  time  when,  without 
change  of  principle,  they  were  hooted  and  persecuted,  was 
a  bitter  change  indeed  ;  and  with  whatever  influence  they 
had  left  they  pleaded  their  rights  to  the  liberty  of 
conscience  which  they  had  always  granted  to  others.  As 
they  were  a  religious,  not  a  political,  body,  they  urged 
that  they  could  not  have  any  corporate  political  opinions, 
and  were  simply  governed  by  the  moral  law  as  they 
understood  it.  They  asked  the  government  to  accept 
their  obedience  to  all  laws  which  they  could  obey  as 


570    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

a  substitute  for  military  aid  to  either  party.  They 
emphasised  the  thought  that  they  sought  to  encourage 
such  a  temper  that  they  could  forgive  all  injuries,  and  be 
friends  to  all  men.  But  such  appeals  count  for  little  in  a 
time  of  war. 

The  Friends  who  were  disowned  generally  took  the 
action  quietly.  Some  had  lost  all  interest  in  Friends, 
and  cared  but  little  for  membership.  Some  were  thankful 
for  the  opportunity  to  pose  as  martyrs  when  they  might 
have  been  brought  up  for  moral  obliquities  or  non- 
attendance  at  any  religious  exercises.  A  few,  like  Owen 
Biddle,  one  of  the  strongest  men  of  the  Yearly  Meeting, 
repented  and  were  reinstated.  Besides  these,  however,  there 
were  those  whose  attachment  to  the  general  principles 
was  sincere.  The  passage  from  one  denomination  to 
another  was  not  so  easy  as  now.  They  did  not  care  to 
be  unchurched,  and  they  wanted  the  simple  unclerical 
worship  of  Friends.  But  they  were  sure  that  their  war 
record  was  right,  and  that  Friends  made  a  mistake  when 
they  did  not  follow  James  Logan  into  the  position  of 
military  resistance  to  aggression.  These  formed  a  society, 
the  Free  Quakers.  The  discipline  was  simple.  No  one 
was  to  be  disowned.  All  were  to  be  encouraged  in  the 
performance  of  their  civil  and  military  duties.  The 
meetings  for  worship  and  business  and  the  habits  of 
living  were  to  be  according  to  the  old  Quaker  customs. 

They  immediately  entered  into  a  controversy  with 
the  main  body  for  the  use  of  the  graveyards  and  other 
property  of  the  Society,  and  carried  the  case  to  the 
Legislature.  They  got  plenty  of  sympathy,  but  their 
disownments  were  so  regular,  and  the  risks  of  interfering 
with  the  internal  affairs  of  a  religious  body  so  great,  that 
they  could  obtain  no  legislative  relief.  They  then  raised 
money  and  built  the  house  now  standing  at  Arch  and 
5th  Street.  Washington  and  Franklin  subscribed.  The 
numbers,  never  large,  gradually  dwindled,  though  worship 
was  maintained  in  the  house  till  1836,  Betsy  Ross,  the 
flag  maker,  being  about  the  last  of  the  original  members. 

We  must  now  take  up  some   of   the  effects  of   the 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS   IN  THE  REVOLUTION        571 

Revolutionary  War  upon  the  main  body  of  Friends  who 
stood  by  their  principles.  They  entered  the  war  something 
of  a  divided  body.  They  came  out  of  it  united  by  the 
separation  of  the  alien  elements  and  the  harmony  induced 
by  suffering.  There  was  no  longer  a  minority  supporting 
war.  If  there  was  a  minority  supporting  active  participa 
tion  in  politics  farther  than  voting  and  holding  local 
offices,  it  was  very  quiet.  Penn  and  Thomas  Lloyd, 
Logan  and  David  Lloyd,  Isaac  Norris  and  John  Kinsey 
had  no  counterparts.  The  work  of  Friends  by  common 
consent  was  to  be  philanthropic  only,  so  far  as  it  touched 
the  outside  world,  but  mainly  it  was  to  be  given  to 
strengthen  the  body  in  its  own  principles  and  testimonies, 
following  the  teachings  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Their  ideals 
of  saintliness  were  expressed  by  Isaac  Penington  and 
John  Woolman. 

Through  these  trying  war  days  it  was  engaged  in 
clearing  its  own  skirts.  The  disasters  which  were  falling 
upon  it  were  judged  to  be  due  to  its  own  unfaithfulness, 
and,  like  Israel  of  old,  it  was  being  urged  by  its  trusted 
leaders  to  give  up  strange  gods,  and  return  to  its  ancient 
worship  in  its  purity. 

In  1777  the  Yearly  Meeting  resolved  upon  what  it 
called  "  a  reformation."  The  organisation  was  set  to 
work  in  all  its  ramifications.  The  Quarterly  Meeting 
appointed  Committees,  and  these,  reinforced  by  local 
Friends,  visited  Meetings  and  families,  pressing  the 
reforms. 

As  an  illustration  of  the  way  the  advice  of  the  Yearly 
Meeting  worked  itself  out  we  will  follow  its  course  in 
Chester  Quarterly  Meeting,  perhaps  the  largest  and  most 
influential  of  the  country  Meetings.  At  the  first  session 
after  the  Yearly  Meeting  the  following  minutes  were 
adopted  : 

"  The  Extracts  from  the  Minutes  of  our  last  Yearly  Meeting 
were  read  over.  And  that  meeting,  having  had  under  their 
weighty  consideration  the  sorrowful  complaints  of  deficiencies 
in  the  religious  care  and  Education  of  the  Youth,  both  with 
respect  to  their  Pious  Education  in  Friends'  families,  and  also 


572    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

their  Schooling,  and  under  the  calming  influence  and  Seasoning 
virtue  of  Truth,  Unanimously  Agreed  to  recommend  this  weighty 
subject  to  the  deep  attention  and  speedy  care  of  Quarterly 
Meetings.  That  they  may  appoint  suitable  Friends  in  each  of 
them  as  Committees  to  visit  the  Monthly,  Preparative,  and 
Particular  Meetings  or  Families  of  Friends  as  Truth  may  point 
out  the  way  for  reformation  with  respect  to  the  due  and  wakeful 
attendance  of  our  religious  Meetings,  plainness  of  Speech, 
Behaviour,  Apparrel,  and  Household  furniture,  with  other 
deficiencies,  mentioned  in  the  Answers  to  the  Queries,  which 
were  the  cause  of  deep  Concern  and  Exercise ;  and  in  order  to 
strengthen  the  hands  of  Friends  in  the  Quarterly  Meetings 
Appointed  a  Committee  of  fourteen  Friends  to  take  the  matter 
relating  to  the  Youth  and  their  religious  Education  and  Schooling 
particularly  under  their  care,  and  give  such  advice  and  assistance 
therein  and  respecting  other  deficiencies  as  they  in  the  wisdom 
of  Truth  may  see  expedient.  Divers  of  which  Committee  from 
other  Quarters  attended  here  to  our  satisfaction,  and  the  subject- 
matter  coming  solidly  under  ye  Consideration  of  this  Meeting, 
and  some  awful  remarks  made  touching  the  necessity  of  a  real 
and  speedy  reformation  in  ye  Church  now  in  this  alarming  season, 
Thomas  Massey,  Caleb  Seal,  Nathan  Yarnal,  Jr.,  Joseph  Talbot, 
Jr.,  John  Perry,  Robert  Valentine,  William  Fell,  and  John 
Humphries  are  appointed  to  the  said  service,  and  are  Particularly 
enjoyned  by  this  Meeting  to  be  careful  to  excite  Friends  (in  the 
Schooling  of  their  Children)  to  put  them  under  the  care  of 
Virtuous  Tutors. 

"  The  care  of  Friends  respecting  Grave  Stones  is  desired  to  be 
continued  untill  they  are  all  removed. 

"  As  the  Reports  from  the  Monthly  Meetings  are  mostly  silent 
respecting  slaves  this  meeting  is  desirous  that  there  may  still  be 
a  fervent  concern  among  Friends  to  labour  with  such  members 
who  retain  any  of  our  fellowmen  in  Bondage  Agreeable  to  the 
repeated  Advice  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  and  render  an  account 
to  our  next  Meeting." 

"  Sundry  of  the  Weighty  Advices  contained  in  the  Extracts 
being  again  read,  and  solidly  considered  and  spoken  to,  particularly 
those  respecting  the  Distiling  and  Use  of  Spirituous  Liquors,  and 
the  polluting  practice  of  keeping  of  Taverns,  Beer-Houses,  etc.,  this 
Meeting,  desirous  that  the  good  End  intended  may  be  answered, 
appoints  Thomas  Metier,  John  Eyre,  Robert  Johnson,  Isaac 
Massey,  Thomas  Swayne,  Isaac  Sharpies,  and  William  Lightfoot 
to  labour  for  a  reformation  among  Friends  in  this  Quarter  in  those 
Respects  as  they  may  be  directed  in  best  Wisdom  agreeable  to 
the  Advice  of  the  Yearly  Meeting,  and  Report  their  care  and  the 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS   IN   THE  REVOLUTION         573 

Circumstance  of  Friends  in  regard  to  those  things  to  a  future 
meeting." 

We  have  here  certain  subjects  of  "  reformation  "  which 
were  to  be  attended  to.  They  ultimately  arranged  them 
selves  under  these  heads : 

1.  Plainness  in  personal  habits,  including  the  abolition 

of  gravestones. 

2.  Schools  and  literature  of  definitely  Friendly  sort. 

3.  Definite  advances  in  the  matter  of  Temperance  and 

the  sale  of  Intoxicants. 

4.  The  extinction  of  slavery  among  themselves. 

5.  The    erection   of  barriers   against   alien   influences 

being  introduced  into  the  Society. 
I.  They  made  a  serious  attempt  to  return  to  primitive 
simplicity  in  their  dress,  habits,  and  furniture.  The 
committee  of  Chester  Quarterly  Meeting  went  vigorously 
to  work.  They  first  visited  their  own  houses  and  the 
houses  of  the  overseers  of  the  several  Meetings,  insisting 
on  the  abolition  of  matters  simply  ornamental,  or  un 
necessarily  complex,  and  striving  to  stir  the  officials  of 
the  Meetings  to  a  sense  of  the  importance  of  their 
example  and  religious  labour  for  their  fellow  members. 
It  was  a  difficult  service,  yet  they  reported  that  on  the 
whole  their  visits  were  well  received  and  effective.  Meet 
ings  were  held  in  which  Friends  were  exhorted  to  return 
to  "  primitive  zeal  and  purity,"  or  as  elsewhere  expressed 
to  "  primitive  zeal,  plainness,  and  circumspect  walking 
amongst  the  professors  of  Truth."  The  committee 
continued  its  work  through  about  four  years,  and  then 
relegated  it  to  committees  appointed  in  the  several 
Monthly  Meetings.  How  much  of  the  services  related  to 
outward  matters,  and  how  much  to  the  weightier  matters 
of  spiritual  growth,  does  not  appear  in  the  minutes.  It 
is  expressed  in  one  minute  as — 

"...  a  revival  of  ancient  simplicity  in  plainness  of  apparel, 
household  furniture,  the  education  of  youth,  and  a  due  and 
wakeful  attendance  of  our  religious  meetings." 

It  was  deemed  a  favourable  time  under  the  impulse 


574    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

gained  by  common  suffering   to   recover  lost  ground  in 
both  these  respects.     As  one  meeting  expresses  it : 

"  Under  the  prevailing  trials  and  difficulties  we  have  a  prospect 
that  some  are  so  loosened  from  outward  things  as  to  promote  a 
more  steady  care  to  keep  to  true  moderation  and  temperance." l 

2.  They  revived  and  developed  the  idea  of  schools 
where  the  elements  of  education  could  be  obtained  under 
religious  influences.  While  one  committee  was  working 
for  a  circumspect  and  zealous  life  among  the  members, 
another  was  equally  interested  in  promoting  a  guarded 
religious  school  education.  A  committee  of  the  Yearly 
Meeting  under  date  of  28th  of  3rd  month  1778  sent 
down  a  stirring  piece  of  advice  to  all  subordinate  meetings 
which  afforded  a  groundwork  of  labour.  They  state 
that  "  corruption "  exists  among  Friends  as  the  result 
of  their  children  mixing  in  schools  with  children  of  a 
different  sort.  They  recall  the  efforts  of  the  earlier 
Friends,  both  in  England  and  America,  to  extend  Christian 
care  to  the  schools,  and  now  "  while  reformation  is  loudly 
called  for,"  they  ask  that  godly  and  consistent  teachers 
shall  be  employed.  The  letter  was  signed  by  Anthony 
Benezet,  Isaac  Zane,  Nicholas  Wain,  Warner  Mifflin,  and 
George  Churchman.  The  committee  visited  all  the  Meet 
ings  in  the  interest  of  this  concern.  It  is  difficult  to 
judge  from  its  reports  how  successful  it  was,  for  they 
usually  state  in  a  general  way  that  the  work  was 
progressing  in  certain  quarters.  This  may  mean  that 
some  new  schools  were  established,  or  that  a  more  careful 
selection  of  teachers  was  made.  The  object,  of  course, 
was  to  influence  the  youth  towards  Friendly  customs 
and  a  Friendly  spirit,  and  so  train  them  for  later  service 
in  the  church. 

We  have  a  more  definite  contribution  to  the  educa 
tional  conditions  of  these  revolutionary  times  in  the 
minutes  of  the  Northern  District  Monthly  Meeting  of 
Philadelphia  of  7th  month,  1779. 

That  Meeting  had  appointed  a  committee  to  inquire 

1  Northern  District  Monthly  Meeting,  Philadelphia,  7th  mo.  1779. 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN  THE  REVOLUTION         575 

into  the  cause  of  "  the  evident  degeneracy  and  corruption 
in  the  manner  of  deportment  of  many  of  the  youth 
among  us."  They  conferred  with  the  "  Overseers  of  the 
Public  Schools."  There  had  been  an  experiment  made, 
they  say,  in  mixing  the  children  of  Friends  with  others 
in  these  schools  which  had  produced  an  unfavourable 
result 

Attempts  would  now  be  made  to  separate  them. 
The  "Overseers"  expressed  a  desire  to  co-operate  with 
the  Monthly  Meetings  so  far  as  the  purposes  and  history 
of  the  schools  would  permit.  They  state  that  the  central 
school  was  started  in  1689  at  the  cost  of  the  Monthly 
Meeting.  As  the  result  of  the  increase  in  value  of  the 
property  owned  by  the  trustees,  and  the  donations  since 
made  by  Friends,  they  had  been  able  to  school  the 
children  of  poor  Friends,  and  some  not  Friends,  freely. 
They  desired  to  employ  masters  who  would  enforce  the 
stringent  rules  made  for  them,  but  these  do  not  always 
meet  with  co-operation  at  the  homes.  They  admit  the 
seriousness  of  the  situation,  and  ask  that  Friends  should 
bestir  themselves.  The  committee  propounded  to  the 
Overseers  a  series  of  questions  as  to  what  steps  the 
Monthly  Meetings  should  take  to  remedy  the  evils, 
whether  the  Friends'  children  may  be  separated  from 
others,  how  far  parents  will  go  in  the  restraint  of  children 
from  running  in  the  streets  with  unsuitable  companions, 
and  whether  parents  are  not  evidently  lacking  in  such 
care,  whether  poor  Friends  have  ample  facilities,  whether 
any  new  regulations  should  be  added,  what  number  of 
schools  are  in  existence,  and  what  is  the  financial  condition 
of  the  trust. 

The  Overseers  in  their  answers  place  the  blame  for 
the  unfavourable  situation  mainly  upon  parents  who  do 
not  guard  their  children's  morals  on  the  street,  and  the 
lack  of  a  pious  education  when  not  under  the  care  of  the 
schools.  They  give  a  list  of  nine  schools  under  their 
care.  One  of  these  is  primarily  for  the  Latin  and  Greek 
languages  taught  to  boys  of  various  denominations.  Two 
are  exclusively  for  Friends'  boys.  Two  schools,  one 


576    QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

under  Anthony  Benezet,  are  for  girls,  some  of  whom  are 
to  be  admitted  free.  Three  are  mixed  schools  both  as 
to  denomination  and  sex,  for  primary  children.  The 
numbers  in  all  of  them  are  not  given,  but  so  far  as  can 
be  judged  they  average  about  fifty.  Up  to  the  war  the 
funds  had  permitted  them  to  admit  many  poor  Friends 
and  others  into  the  schools,  but  now,  owing  doubtless 
to  the  depreciation  resulting  from  the  troublous  times, 
there  was  little  money  available  for  charity,  indeed  they 
were  in  debt  to  some  of  the  teachers. 

This  narration  throws  much  light  on  the  question  of 
education  among  the  Friends  of  Philadelphia.  The 
original  school  of  William  Penn  now  had  these  nine 
branches  presumably  educating  some  four  hundred  children. 
They  were  supplying  education  at  cost  to  the  most  of 
these  children,  and  the  income  of  money  invested  enabled 
them  to  grant  it  freely  to  some  others.  Presumably  the 
children  of  Friends  had  first  claims,  and  others  were 
aided  with  the  superfluity.  Except  among  the  little 
children  there  was  no  co-education.  One  school,  probably 
for  those  in  better  circumstances,  was  a  classical  school, 
but  there  was  "  occasionally  taught  writing  and  arithmetic 
and  some  branches  of  mathematics."  In  the  other  schools 
there  were  taught  reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic,  and 
apparently  these  branches  only.  It  was  the  era  when 
children  were  to  be  made  good  by  the  observance  of 
many  restrictions  laid  down  for  them  by  wise  committees, 
before  student  responsibility  for  government  was  much 
recognised.  The  Overseers  disclaim  the  suggestion  that 
the  badness  of  certain  youth  was  the  fault  of  the  schools, 
and  place  it,  probably  justly,  on  the  parents  who  were 
not  careful  to  discourage  street  associations,  and  for  this 
they  had  no  remedy  except  advice. 

Under  other  management  schools  for  negro  children 
were  established  about  1773,  but  how  extensive  this 
movement  was  during  the  war  it  is  difficult  to  determine. 

3.  They  abolished  tavern -keeping  and  the  sale  of 
spirituous  liquors  by  their  members,  and  made  a  de 
termined  attempt  to  limit  their  use.  Coincidently  with 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS   IN  THE  REVOLUTION         577 

the  others  a  third  committee  was  working  in  Chester 
Quarterly  Meeting  on  this  subject.  It  reported  some 
deficiency  and  then  the  matter  was  referred  to  the 
Monthly  Meetings  : 

"  At  the  Meeting  in  the  Eleventh  month  was  also  appointed 
a  committee  to  labour  for  a  Reformation  in  Respect  to  ye 
Distiling  and  Use  of  Spirituous  Liquors  amongst  Friends  and 
the  Polluting  Practice  of  keeping  Taverns,  Beerhouses,  etc. 
Agreeable  to  the  advice  of  the  Yearly  Meeting.  Which  Com 
mittee  now  reported  That  they  attended  to  the  services  "  And 
visited  friends  in  their  Particular  Meetings  and  taken  other 
opportunity's  with  some  Friends  who  keep  Publick  houses  of 
entertainment  and  such  as  keep  Stills,  etc.,  and  find  that  there 
are  some  Friends  in  each  Meeting  who  are  concerned  to  have 
the  advice  of  the  Yearly  Meeting  put  in  Practice,  a  number  of 
Friends  having  Used  Spirituous  Liquors  very  Sparingly  in  ye 
time  of  our  late  Harvest  and  others  have  with  great  satisfaction 
used  none  at  all.  Yet  think  the  care  of  monthly  meetings 
should  be  continued  in  these  Respects  as  there  are  among 
Friends  who  are  not  sensible  enough  of  the  necessity  of  dis 
couraging  a  Practice  that  has  tended  much  to  Corrupt  the 
inhabitants  of  this  Land.  Which  Rep'  was  read  and  approved, 
and  the  monthly  meetings  desired  to  have  these  matters  closely 
under  care  accordingly  and  Report  their  Several  Circumstances 
and  how  far  Friends  do  keep  to  the  advice  of  the  Yearly  Meet 
ing  therein  to  next  meeting." 

It  was  reported  in  5  mo.  1779  that  "very  few  Friends 
are  now  concerned  in  keeping  taverns  in  our  Quarter," 
and  again  "  we  observe  a  growing  care  among  Friends  to 
avoid  the  unnecessary  use  of  spirituous  liquors."  Three 
months  later 

"...  very  satisfactory  progress  has  been  made  in  each  meeting  in 
dissuading  Friends  from  keeping  houses  of  public  entertainment, 
beer  houses,  etc.,  insomuch  that  very  few  are  now  concerned 
therein." 

In  8  mo.  1780  they  say: 

"  There  are  one  or  two  Friends  who  continue  in  the  practice 
of  keeping  taverns  within  the  verge  of  this  quarter." 

A  year  later 

"...  it  does  not  appear  that  any  Friends  are  concerned  in 

2  P 


578    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES   BK.  v 

keeping  public  houses  except  some  women  whose  husbands  do 
not  belong  to  Friends," 

and  this  list  the  next  year  was  reduced  to  one  woman. 

4.  They  finished  up  the  process  of  freeing  their  slaves. 
When    the   war  ended    none  were  left    except  in  cases 
where  husband  or  wife  was   not   a   member,  and  where 
complete  manumission  could  not  be  secured — or  where 
they  were  held  in  trust  tied  down  by  old  deeds  or  wills. 
The    long    struggle,  beginning   when    Pastorius    and  his 
friends    of   Germantown    memorialized   their   meeting   in 
1688,  was  won  about  a  century  later.     Before  the  close 
of  the  war  the  Friends  had  also  the  satisfaction  of  seeing 
a   manumission  measure    passed    by  the  state  of  Penn 
sylvania,  the  first  in  the  country,  though  as  one  of  the 
opposite  party  expressed  it : 

"  Our  bill  astonishes  and  pleases  the  Quakers.  They  looked 
for  no  such  benevolent  issue  of  our  new  government  exercised 
by  Presbyterians." 

The  Friends  were  doubtless  pleased.  Their  previous 
work  had  cut  the  ground  from  under  the  institution,  and 
though  the  triumph  had  come,  under  the  exigencies  of  the 
times,  when  they  were  out  of  government,  the  moral 
advance  was  no  less  gratifying  to  them. 

Henceforward  their  attention  was  to  be  turned  to  the 
development  of  the  freed  negroes  by  education  and 
employment,  and  the  advance  of  the  cause  of  abolition  in 
the  country  at  large. 

5.  They  drew  the  line  more  closely  about  their  own 
membership  in  opposing  participation  with  others  in  any 
religious  work,  even  to  the  extent  of  attendance  on  other 
religious  services,  on    the    ground    that   their   testimony 
against  preaching  for  pay  and  without  conscious  inspira 
tion,  could   not  be  maintained  in  its  integrity.      In  the 
country  districts  especially  they  had  been  much  by  them 
selves  out  of  touch  with  other  denominations.     Political 
lines  were  drawn  on  the  basis  of  church  affiliation,  and  an 
element  of  suspicion  was  thus  introduced.     Their  testi 
monies  therefore  reinforced  their  traditional  and  political 


CH.  ix       FRIENDS  IN   THE  REVOLUTION         579 

opposition  to  mingling  with  others,  and  in  school  and 
society  and  church  services  they  constituted  themselves 
a  body  apart  from  others,  a  tendency  which  the  war 
greatly  strengthened. 

These  "  reformations  "  were  decreed  and  carried  out  in 
the  midst  of  the  war.  The  heated  air  of  strife  was 
around  them.  Matters  were  going  any  way  but  theirs  in 
the  State  and  in  moral  standards.  They  simply  drew 
together  as  the  world  turned  against  them,  more  certain 
of  their  ground,  more  determined  to  maintain  it  at  any 
cost  of  suffering  and  unpopularity.  If  all  around  had 
conspired,  as  it  seemed,  to  annul  Penn's  Holy  Experiment 
they  would  renew  it,  not  externally,  that  appeared  hope 
less,  but  in  the  hearts  of  a  devoted  band.  Let  others  do 
as  they  would,  they  would  serve  the  Lord  according  to 
the  preaching  and  example  of  George  Fox  and  the  other 
heroes  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Nor  were  they  without  encouragement.  A  great 
revival  of  religious  interest  followed  the  labours  of  the 
Committees.  Many  young  men,  prominent  afterwards, 
consecrated  themselves  to  the  work.  A  real  zeal  and 
spiritual  enthusiasm  followed  the  indifference  of  the  days 
just  before  the  war.  New  and  acceptable  preachers 
sprang  up.  The  Query  then  standing  "  What  remark 
able  convincements  since  last  report  ?  "  was  nearly  always 
answered,  "  A  number  of  solid  Friends  have  joined  the 
Society."  The  years  to  come  were  to  show  the  greatest 
growth  of  numbers  of  any  score  since  the  settlement,  so 
that  by  the  end  of  the  century  there  were  probably  40,000 
Friends  in  the  Yearly  Meeting. 

The  Revolutionary  War  left  Philadelphia  Yearly 
Meeting  more  moral  internally,  more  devoted  to  moral 
reforms,  more  conservative  of  ancient  tradition,  custom, 
and  doctrine,  more  separate  from  the  world,  more  intro- 
versive  in  spirit,  than  it  found  it.  In  fact  the  Quakerism 
of  the  youth  of  some  of  us,  in  important  particulars  had 
its  origin  here,  and  would  have  been  greatly  different  had 
the  Society  not  gone  through  this  ordeal.  Had  the 
active  public-spirited  Friends,  who  went  off  with  the 


58o    QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES    BK.  v 

revolutionary  movement,  remained  to  mould  their  genera 
tion,  a  type  more  outward,  more  progressive,  more 
intellectual  would  have  resulted.  Had  the  Society 
drifted  along  as  it  was  drifting  prior  to  the  conflict  a 
moral  stringency,  since  characteristic  of  Quakerism,  could 
hardly  have  been  maintained.  As  a  result  of  the  narrow 
ing  and  uniting  processes  combined  Friends  are  what  they 
are.  What  they  would  have  been  with  a  wider  outlook 
upon  life  and  a  looser  standard  of  conduct,  we  can 
only  conjecture.  But  he  who  understands  Philadelphia 
Quakerism  of  a  century  past  must  read  it  in  the  light 
of  the  Revolution — a  revolution  not  less  in  Quaker 
development  than  in  American  history. 


INDEX 


Accomack — 

meeting  in,  305 

migration  from,  335-337 
Adams,  John,  255  «. 
Akehurst,  Daniel,  291 

deputy  for  John  Archdale,  340 

in  politics,  344  «. 
Akin,  John,  155 
Albemarle   country,    283,    285,    299, 

344.  350 

counties  included  in,  287 
Albemarle,  Duke  of,  338 
Alden,  John,  61  n. 
Allen,  Jedediah,  146  w. 
Allen,  William- 
meeting  in  house  of,  141  «.,  143 

on  tithes,  154 
Almy,  Job,  210 
Ambrose,  Alice — 

in  Piscataqua,  103,  104,  130 

whipping  of,  104,  105,  276  ». 

in  Virginia,  276 
Anabaptists,  19,  23  n. 

captured  Miinster,  30  «. 

in  Dover,  104 

in  Holland,  215 

in  Long  Island,  215-219 

in  Lynn,  216 

in  Virginia,  271  n. 

forerunners  of  Quakers,  215,  219 
Anamessicks — 

meeting  in,  305 

settlement  of,  335-337 
Andrews,  Edward,  388 
Andrews,  Peter,  380 
Andrews,  Samuel,  245  n. ,  250 
Andros,  Edmund — 

letter  to  W.  Coddington,  187 

Governor  of  united  Royal  Colony, 

I93-I9S 

Governor  of  New  York,  228  «. 

Governor  of  Jerseys,  363 
Angell,  John,  120 
Anne,  Queen,  154  «.,  432 

Jerseys  surrendered  to,  368,  383 


Anthony,  Joseph,  155 
Antinomian  controversy,  4 

point  at  issue,  7-14,  21  ». 

cause  of  name,  14  n. 

sympathisers  and  opponents,  8 

pronounced  on  by  synod,  15,  16 

and  founding  of  Rhode  Island,  21 
Aplin,  John,  210 
Aquidneck    (see    Rhode    Island),    21, 

22  n. 
Archdale,  John — 

proprietor  of  Carolinas,  340 

Governor  of  Carolinas,    328,    343, 
380 

agent  of  Governor  of  Maine,  340 

in  the  Carolinas,  340-350,  462 

elected  to  English  Parliament,  xiv, 
349 

will  of,  350  n. 

book  of,  351 

Arnold,  Benedict,  189-191 
Articles  of  Confederation,  559 
Ashbridge,  George,  493 
Aspinwall,  William — 

in  Antinomian  controversy,  8 

banished,  22  n. 

a  founder  of  Rhode  Island,  22  «. 
Atherton,  Humphrey,  89 
Audland,  John,  74 
Audubon,  J.  J.,  467 
Austin,  Ann — 

comes  to  America,  4,  26,  266,  358 

early  life,  27 

in  Barbadoes,  27,  28 

in  Boston,  28,  29,  65 
Austin,  Jeremiah,  158 
"Awakening,  Great,"  The,  128,  410 

Bacon  Rebellion,  289 

Baldwin,  John,  267 

Baltimore,  Lord,  331,  333 
and  William  Penn,  419,  432 

Baptist  church — 

founded  in  Newport,  23,  24 
some  members  join  Quakers,  53  n. 


581 


582      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Barbadoes — 

the  port  of  entry  to  the  Colonies,  26- 
27 

"  Nursery  of  the  Truth,"  41,  280 

visitors  to,  41-43,  44,   70  «.,    HI, 
280 

meetings  in,  41 

number  of  Quakers  in,  112  n. 

letter  to  Governor  of,  in 

slavery  in,  395 
Barclay,  David,  492 
Barclay,  Robert — 

Governor  of  East  Jersey,  368,  369 

and  George  Keith,  445,  446,  452 

Apology  of,  545 
Barefoot,  Walter,  frees  Quaker  women, 

IOS 

Barker,   Robert,  meeting  in  house  of, 

140  n. 

Bartlett,  Moses,  128  n. 
Barton,  Edward,  379 
Bartram,  John,  467,  529 
Bayly,  Charles,  267 

follower  of  John  Perrot,  267  n. 
Beasley,  Elizabeth,  267 
Bellingham,  Richard — 

deals  with  first  Quakers,  28 

pamphlet  of,  93 

Governor  of  Massachusetts,  180 
Benezet,    Anthony,    515,     516,     574, 

576 

Bennett,  Major-General,  285 
Berkeley,  Bishop — 

on  slavery,  158  n. 

in  Newport,  203 
Berkeley,  John,  Lord — 

proprietor  of  New  Jersey,  362,  363 

proprietor  of  Carolina,  364 
Berkeley,  Sir  John,  340 
Berkeley,  Sir  William,  285,  362 

and  Quakers  in  Virginia,  272,  274 
Bermuda,  26 

Quaker  visits  to,  44 
Berry,  Margaret,  314 
Berry,  William,  276  n. ,  290 

in  politics,  331-333 
Berwick,  Quakerism  in,  131-133 
Biddle,  William,  meeting  in  house  of, 

376,  393 

Biggs,  Timothy,  340 
Bill  of  Rights,  in  Virginia,  318 
Birkhead,  Abraham,  330 
Bishop,  George,  writes  New  England 

Judged,  9,  78 
Blackwell,  John,  424,  480 
Blair,  John,  350 
Blunston,  John,  443 
Bond,  John,  335 
Borden,  Richard,  154  n. 
Borden,  William,  353 


Boston — 

Antinomian  controversy  in,  4-22 
Quakers  in,   28,  36-40,  54,  55,  57, 

66,  67,  70-72,  79,  80-89,  94-104, 

106,  107 
ideals  of  founders  of,   xx-xxii,   100, 

265 

Quaker  Meeting  in,  99,  102,  137 
Quaker  Meeting  prohibited,  no  «. 
Samuel  Fothergill  in,  129-130 
Boston,  Henry,  337 
Bownas,  Samuel,  144  «. 
visits  Long  Island,  234 
imprisoned,  235-236,  392 
rights  of  jury  maintained  at  trial  of, 

235 

visits  New  Jersey,  392 

and  George  Keith,  234,  392,  455, 456 

in  Pennsylvania,  523,  525 
Bowne,  Daniel,  257 
Bowne,  John — 

becomes  Quaker,  227 

persecution  of,  227-228 

meeting  in  house  of,  227 

leaderofLong  Island  Quakers,  144*2., 

245  n.,  246  n. ,  250,  255  n. 
Bowne,  Samuel,  253  n. 
Bowne,  Samuel,  jun.,  257 
Bowron,    John,    first   Quaker   foreign 

missionary,  43 
Bracket,  Thomas,  69  n. 
Bradford,  William,  370,  531 

in    Keith    controversy,     379,    451, 

455 

authorised    printer  of    Philadelphia 

Yearly  Meeting,  545 
Brend,  William — 

comes  to  Boston,  36-39 

comes  to  Boston  again,  46,  47,  57 

in  Plymouth  Colony,  61 

in  Providence,  63 

persecution  of,  70-72,  88 

in  Barbadoes,  70  n. 
Brenton,  Jahleel,  198 
Brenton,  William,  22,  23 
Brewster,  Margaret — 

appears  as  sign,  109 

last    woman     to     suffer    whipping, 

no  n. 
Briggs,    Thomas,    in    Barbadoes    and 

Jamaica,  in,  112 
Brocksoppe,  Joan — 

released  from  Boston  prison,  94 

in  Virginia,  274  n. 
Brookes,  Michael,  277 

in  politics,  330 
Brown,  Goold,  68  «. 
Brown,  John,  211 
Brown,  John  (of  Long  Island),  248 
Brown,  Judith,  whipping  of,  102 


INDEX 


583 


Brown,  Moses — 

joins  Quakers,  165  «. 

and  education,  167  n. 

work  in  Providence,  209,  211 
Bryant,  Ruth,  202 
Budd,  Thomas,  377,  403 

leads  a  secession,  379,  453 

and  education,  407 
Buffum,  Joshua  and  wife,  108 

early  Salem  Quakers,  69  n. 

banished,  77 
Bull,  Henry- 
sympathiser  with  Anne  Hutchinson, 
192  n. 

marries  Ann  Easton,  192  n. 

Governor  of  Rhode  Island,  192,  195 
Bull,  Jireh,  114  n. 
Bull,  Stephen,  345 
Burden,  Ann,  45  n. 
Burges,  William,  277 

in  politics,  330 
Burling,  John,  257 
Burling,  Thomas,  256 
Burlington — 

Quakers  land  at,  367,  381 

Quaker  Meetings  in  372-377 

meeting  house  in  376,  377 

Monthly  Meeting  sends  first  epistle 
to  London  Yearly  Meeting,  373 

school  in,  407 

prominent  Quakers  in,  408,  409 

description  of  Quakers  in,  419  n. 
Burlington  path,  359 
Burnyeat,  John,  331  n. 

at    New    England   Yearly   Meeting, 
54  n.,  112 

in  debate  with  Roger  Williams,  116 

travels  through  New  England,  118- 

121 

in  Long  Island,  229-230,  438 
holds  first  Quaker  Meeting  in  New 

York  City,  230 
brings  record  book  from  George  Fox, 

244 

in  Maryland,  280,  281 
in  Virginia,  280,  302  ». ,  303 
Burrough,  Edward — 

defends  Quakers  before  Charles  II., 

93.  94 

writings  attacked  by  George  Keith, 

455 

Burstow,  John,  95 
Burton,  John,  69  «. 
Byllynge,    Edward,    in   West    Jersey, 

363-  364.  38o.  3Sl 

Camm,  John,  74 

Canons  and  Institutions,  229  n.,  438, 

456 
Caplin,  Charles,  267 


Carlisle,  Abraham,  567 
Carolina,  North — 

Quakers     in,    gathered    from    un 
churched,  265,  284,  287,  321 
George  Fox  in,  283,  285-287 
William    Edmundson   in,    283-285, 

287,  289 

Quaker  visitors  to,  290-295 
slavery  in,  322-326 
migrations  to,  295,  297,  298 
Scotch-Irish  in,  298 
meetings  in,  297,  298,  299 
business  meetings  in,  307,  308 
Quakerism  first   organised   form   of 

religion  in,  xv,  338 
Culpepper  rebellion,  340 
Quakers   and   politics  in,    339-353, 

462 

number  of  Quakers  in,  xvi,  351 
English  Church  in,  350,  351 
Carolina,  South — 
Quakers  in,  298-300 
meetings  in,  308  n. 
John  Archdale,  Governor  of,  344-349 
Huguenots  in,  347,  348 
Established  Church  in,  351 
Carolinas — 

proprietors  of,  338,  340 

division  of,  342  n. 

John  Archdale,    Governor    of,    xv, 

342-344 

Carpenter,  Samuel,  435,  480 
Carr,  Caleb- 
becomes  a  Quaker,  174 
in  Rhode  Island  politics,  174,  184, 

192 

Governor  of  Rhode  Island,  197 
spiritual  leader  of  Quakers,  200 
Carteret,  Sir  George,  362 
proprietor  of  Carolina,  364 
obtains  grant  of   East  Jersey,   363- 

365 
Carteret,  Governor  of  North  Carolina, 

339 

Carteret,  Philip,  362 
Cartwright,  John — 

in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica,  in,  112 

in  Rhode  Island,  112 

in    debate    with    Roger    Williams, 
118  n. 

travels  in  New  England,  120 
Gary,  Miles,  291 
Gary,  Thomas,  291 
Gary,  Thomas,  352 
Case,  Thomas,  232,  233 
Chalkley,  Thomas — 

life  of,  124  n. 

in  Nantucket,  134 

m  New  York,  238,  239 

in  South  Carolina,  299 


584      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Chalkley,  Thomas  (contd. ) — 

in  New  Jersey,  388 

in  Pennsylvania,  454,  498,  523,  530 
Chamberlein,  John — 

released  from  prison,  99 

whipped,  102 

holds  meeting  in  his  house,  99,  102, 

137 

marries  Catherine  Chattam,  108  «. 
Charles  II.,  King,  432 

and  Quakers  in  America,  91-94,  101 

mandamus  to  Governor  Endicott,  98 

Dutch  wars  under,  174,  362 

on  religious  liberty  in  Virginia,  272 

on  religious  liberty  in  North  Caro 
lina,  320,  338 
Charleston,  299,  300,  344 

relief  for  fire  in,  553 
Chattam,  Catherine — 

released  from  Boston  prison,  95 

appears  as  a  sign,  108 

whipped,  108  n. 

marries  John  Chamberlein,  108  n. 
Chester,  419,  420,  421,  465 

Monthly  Meeting  in,  440 

Quarterly  Meeting  in,  440,  571-573, 

577 

Friends  in,  on  slavery,  511,  513,  514 
Chew,  Ann,  305 
Choptank,  276  n.,  279  «. ,  295,  305, 

313 
Christison,  Wenlock — 

tried  and  sentenced  to  death,  95-97 

set  free,  97 

in  Maryland,  304,  313,  331 

and  slavery,  322 

meeting  in  house  of,  304,  306,  331 

in  politics,  331,  332 
Chuckatuck,  292,  295  n. ,  306,  307  «. 
Church,  Established— 

in  Massachusetts,  35,  265,  317 

in  New  York,  392,  456 

in  Virginia,  xv,  265,  269-272,  317, 
318  n. 

in  Maryland,  466 

in  the  Carolinas,  320,  321,  350-353 

in  New  Jersey,  387,  392 

George  Keith  and,  454,  458 

members   of,   hold  political  offices, 
466 

problem  of,  466 
Churchman,  George,  574 
Churchman,  John — 

travels  in  Maine,  131-132 

in  Pennsylvania,  535,  540 
Claridge,  Richard;  455 
Clark,  Mary,  goes  to  Boston,  47,  48, 

57 

Clarke,  Jeremiah,  a  founder  of  Rhode 
Island,  53 


Clarke,  John,  22 

forms  Baptist  Church,  23,  24 
Colonial  agent  in  England,  52,  172, 

173 
Clarke,  Walter — 

becomes  a  Quaker,  53,  174 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  177,  184, 
191,  193-195,  199,  200 

Governor,    185  n. ,    188,   189,   192, 
197 

stands  on  rights  of  Charter,  198  n. 

spiritual  leader  of  Quakers,  200 
Clarkson,  Robert — 

becomes  Quaker,  266 

letter  to  E.  Harris,  267 

fined  for  violating  Military  Act,  268 

in  politics,  330 
Clayborn,  William,  291,  293 
Cleaton,  Ann,  79  n. 
Cleave,  Elizabeth,  233 
Clift,  Benjamin,  528 
Clifton,  Hope,  80 
Coale,  Josiah,  364 

early  life,  74 

journey     from    Virginia     to     New 
England,  73,  74,  273 

in  Long  Island,  225 

in  Virginia,  267,  268,  269 

in  Maryland,  276,  303 

banished  from  Maryland,  279,  303 

commissioned  to  buy  Indian  lands, 

xiv,  358,  418 
Cock,  Henry,  254  n. 
Cock,  John,  257 
Coddington,  William — 

in  Antinomian  controversy,  8,  ir,  16 

defends  Anne  Hutchinson,  19 

forced   out    of    Massachusetts,    20, 
22  n.,  171 

first  Judge  of  Newport,  22,  172 

Governor  at  Newport,  23,  172,  179, 
181,  191 

influence  on  government  in  Rhode 
Island,  173,  191 

leader  of  new  religious  group,    23- 

25.  171 

becomes  a  Quaker,  53,  173 
meeting  in  house  of,  137,  179 
fails  to   bring    Rhode    Island    into 
New  England  Confederacy,  172 

Coddington,  William,  jun. ,  Governor 
of  Rhode  Island,  192 

Coffin,  James,  123 

Coffin,  Tristram,  123 

Coggeshall,  John — 

in  Antinomian  controversy,  8,  16 
disfranchised,  22  n. 
Elder  in  Rhode  Island,  22 
President  of  Rhode  Island,  172 
leader  of  new  religious  group,  23-25 


INDEX 


585 


Coggeshall,  Joshua — 

becomes  Quaker,  53,  173 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  177,  184, 

189 

Cole,  Thomas,  267,  268 
Cole,  William,  267,  268,  282  «.,  331 «. 

imprisoned  in  Virginia,  272 

meeting  in  house  of,  330 
Coleman,  Ann — 

in  Piscataqua,  103,  104 

whipping  of,  104,  105 
Coleman,  Isaac,  123 
Coleman,  Joseph,  on  tithes,  154 
Colleton,  Sir  John,  338 
Ceilings,  Samuel,  143  «. 
Collins,  Moses,  130 
Collins,  Stephen,  130 
Colonial  Congress,  209 
Comstock,  Ezekiel,  165 
Conant,  Richard,  345 
Concessions,  etc. ,  of  proprietors  of  New 

Jersey,  364,  365 
Congdon,  Joseph,  165 
Connecticut — 

Quakers  in,  61,  72,  121,  123 

John  Winthrop,  jun. ,  Governor  of, 
86,  121 

encroaches  on  Narragansett,  190 

Charter  hunt  in,  194 

George  Fox  in,  230 
Continental  Congress,  504,  558,  561, 

566 

Conventicle  Act,  417 
Cooper,  William,  379 
Copeland,  John — 

comes  to  Boston,  36 

returns  to  Boston,  46,  47,  75 

in  Sandwich,  57-60 

in  Scituate,  61 

in  Salem,  65-66 

imprisoned,  etc.,  66,  67 

issues  Declaration  of  Faith,  67 

suffers  ear-cropping,  75 

in  England,  90 

in  Virginia,  292 
Cornell,  Thomas,  jun.,  154  ». 
Correspondence  between  Yearly  Meet 
ings,  252,  314,  319,  373,  512,  560 
Cotton,  John,  30 

comes  to  Boston,  5 

type  of  preacher,  7,  8,  10,  n 

at  trial  of  Anne  Hutchinson,  17,  20 
Cowland,  Alice,  80 
Cowperthwaite,  Henry,  246  «. 
Cowperthwaite,  Hugh,  245  «. 
Cowsnocke,  Peter,  79  n. 
Cranston,  John,  115 

not  a  Quaker,  177  «. 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  177,  178, 
188 


Cranston,  Samuel,  Governor  of  Rhode 

Island,  199 
Craven,  Lord,  343 
Crew,  John,  319  n. 
Cromwell,  Oliver,  u,  48,  121  «. 
Cuffee,  Paul,  397 
Culpepper's  Rebellion,  340 

Daniels,  John,  69  «. 
Dankers,  Jasper,  361  n. ,  419 
Dartmouth — 

Yearly  Meeting,  144  «. 

assessors    refuse    to    collect    tithes, 

155 

Davies,  Richard,  442 
Davis,  Nicholas,  banished  from  Boston, 

79 

Day,  Elizabeth,  379 
Deacon,  George,  379 

in  New  Jersey  politics,  385 
Death,  sentence  of,  against  Marmaduke 
Stephenson,  84 

William  Robinson,  84 

Mary  Dyer,  84,  87 

William  Leddra,  88 

Wenlock  Christison,  96 
Declaration  of  Faith,  xxiii 

earliest  of  Quakers,  67,  68 

letter  of  George  Fox  not  a,  112 

in  Keith  controversy,  447 

individual  adoption  of,  not  required, 

45° 
Declaration  of  Independence,  206,  212, 

569 
early  movements  toward,  198  n. ,  206, 

209-211,  464,  558-562 
Delaware,   granted  to  William  Penn, 

419 

Dell,  William,  545 
Demon,  Richard,  218 
Dewes,  Colonel,  285 
Dewsbury,  William,  13  «.,  42,  48,  385, 

417 

at  meeting  in  Bristol,  77 

"convinces"  Richard  Smith,  219 
Dickinson,  James — 

in  New  York,  238 

in  North  Carolina,  350 

in  New  Jersey,  387 

in  Pennsylvania,  523 

and  George  Keith,  452 
Dickinson,  John,  559.  560,  561,  562 
Discipline — 

of  London  Yearly  Meeting,  229  »., 
411,  438 

in     Philadelphia     Yearly     Meeting, 

535 
Disownments — 

Nathanael  Greene,  151 
Samuel  Rodman,  163 


586      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Disownments  (contd. ) — 
Joshua  Rathbun,  163  n. 
Stephen  Hopkins,  165,  212 
Charles  Lynch,  338 

George  Keith,  370,  383 

Thomas  Mifflin,  565 

for  holding  slaves,  520 

in  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting,  551, 

552,  564,  565 
Distraints — 

for  hiring  substitutes  in  war,  etc. ,  150, 
319.  393.  412.  568 

for  tithes,  153,  317,  318,  554 
Dixon,  Ambrose,  336 
Dixon,  William,  322 
Dobson,  Thomas,  257 
Dorsey,  Ann,  267 
Doty,  Isaac,  257 
Doudney,  Richard — 

goes  to  Boston,  47,  48 

lands  first  in  New  York,  51,  220 

signs  Declaration  of  Faith,  67 

in  Long  Island,  221 
Doughty,  Francis,  218 
Dover — 

Hansard  Knollys  in,  104 

Anabaptists  in,  104 

Quakers  come  to,  103,  104 

Quakers  persecuted  in,  104 
D'Oyley,  Edward,  43 
Drinker,  Henry,  567 
Drisius,  Samuel,  218,  220,  225 
Duckett,  Thomas,  383,  453 
Dudley,  Thomas,  8,  16,  17 
Dunch,  Walter,  father  of  Lady  Moody, 

216 

Durand,  George,  330,  340 
Durand,  William — 

Commissioner  for  Maryland,  267  ». 
268,  329 

becomes  Quaker,  267 

in  Carolina,  329 
Durham,  Quakers  in,  133 
Dutch  settlers,  215,  358,  367,  377,  378, 
419,  422,  475 

and  Indians,  495 
Duxbury — 

Quaker  meeting  in,  140  n. 

attempt  to  suppress  meeting  in,  141  n. 

business  meeting  in,  141,  144  n. 
Dyer,  Mary — 

in  Antinomian  controversy,  8 

and  Anne  Hutchinson,  21 

returns  to  Boston,  45  n. ,  80 

becomes  Quaker  Minister,  53 

travels  in  New  England,  70 

banished  from  Boston,  79 

dying  testimony,  84 

sentenced  to  death,  84 

reprieved,  86 


Dyer  Mary  (contd. ) — 

in  Shelter  Island,  86 

execution  of,  87,  89 
Dyer,  William,  pleads  for  his  wife,  87 

Easton,  John — 

becomes  a  Quaker,  53,  173 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  174,  177, 
179,  182,  189,  192 

Governor  of  Rhode  Island,  195 

spiritual  leader  of  Quakers,  200 
Easton,  Nicholas — 

in  Antinomian  controversy,  8 

Elder  in  Newport,  22,  173 

builds  first  house  in  Newport,  22  ». , 

173 

a  leader  of  new  religious  group,  23-25 
becomes  a  Quaker,  53,  173 
Governor  of  Rhode  Island,  112,  174, 

177 

war  policy  of,  174-179 
death  of,  180 

widow  of,  marries  H.  Bull,  192  n. 
Easton,  Peter,  in  Rhode  Island  politics, 

176  «. ,  192 

Easton,  Samuel,  166  n. 
Eaton,  Samuel,  30 
Eaton,  Theophilus,  30 
Eccles,    Solomon,    in    Barbadoes    and 

Jamaica,  in,  112 
Edmondson,  John,  331 

in  politics,  332-333 
Edmundson,  William — 
in  Barbadoes,  in 
in  Jamaica,  112 
in  Ireland,  422 
in  debate  with  Roger  Williams,  116, 

118  n. 
first  missionary  visit  in  New  England, 

121-123 

in  Newport,  188  »,  189-190 
in  Long  Island,  231 
in  Virginia,  283,  285,  289,  303,  395 
in  North  Carolina,    283-285,    287, 

289,  290,  339 
in  Maryland,  289 
in  New  Jersey,  360 
Education,  xxvi-xxix 

Quakers  and,  in  New  England,  166- 

167 

in  New  York,  261-262 
in  Southern  Colonies,  309 
in  New  Jersey,  407,  408 
in  Pennsylvania,   440,   441,   527, 

53°.  SS8,  S7i.  574-576 
Edwards,  Jonathan,  128 
Elders,  439.  538 
Eliot,  Quakers  in,  104,  130,  131 
Ellis,  William,  in  Burlington,  387 
Ellwood,  Thomas,  380,  384 


INDEX 


587 


Ellyson,  Thomas,  319  n. 
Ely,  John,  335 
Emerton,  Humphry,  310 
Emigration,  Quaker,   causes  for,   357, 

364,  369,  371,  420,  421 
Endicott,  John,  8,  76,  100 
sentences  Quakers  to  death,  84,  87, 

96 

and  Samuel  Shattuck,  98-99 
Elizabeth    Hooton    at    funeral    of, 

107  n. ,  no  n. 
England — 

political   relations  with,    in    Massa 
chusetts,  100,  101,  196 
in  Rhode  Island,   192-195,    196- 

199,  205-207,  209-211 
in  Pennsylvania,  468 
and  Pennsylvania  compared,  420, 421 
Quakers  in  politics  of,  xiv,  459,  460, 

461,  462 

number  of  Quakers  in,  xv 
Estaugh,  John,  389 
Estes,  Matthew,  143  n. 
Estes,  Richard,  143  ». 
European  Dyet,  etc.,  An,  430 

and  Hague  Congress,  431,  464 
Evans,  John,  424,  484,  488 
Evans,  Peter,  42 
Everitt,  John,  279  n. 
Exile,  sentence  of,  against — 
John  Wheelwright,  15 
Anne  Hutchinson,  20 
William  Aspinwall,  22  n. 
Nicholas  Upsall,  40 
Lawrence  and  Cassandra  Southwick, 

77 

Joshua  Buffum,  77 

Samuel  Shattuck,  77 

Nicholas  Phelps,  77 

Josiah  Southwick,  77 

William  Robinson,  79 

Marmaduke  Stephenson,  79 

Mary  Dyer,  79 

Nicholas  Davis,  79 

Christopher  Holder,  80 

William  Leddra,  88 

Edward  Wharton,  89  «. 

Richard  Smith,  219  n. 

Alice  Ambrose,  276  n. 

Mary  Tomkins,  276  n. 

Thomas  Thurston,  278 

Josiah  Coale,  279 

Philadelphia,  Friends  during  Revolu 
tion,  567 
Eyre,  John,  572 

Falmouth,  Maine  (now  Portland), 
Quaker  Meeting  in,  130,  133 

Falmouth  (Massachusetts),  founding  of, 
60 


Farnum,  Moses,  150,  165 
Farrington,  Abraham,  380 
Farrington,  Dorothy,  249 
Feake,  John,  245  n. ,  250 
Feake,    Tobias,     signs    Flushing    re 
monstrance,  224 
Fell,  Henry- 
visits  Barbadoes,  41-43 

letter  of,  64,  65 

goes  to  New  England,  79  K. 
Fell,  William,  572 
Fenwick,  John,  in  West  Jersey,  363, 

364,  366 

Fielding,  Joshua,  294 
Fishbourne,  Ralph,  334 
Fisher,  Mary — 

in  America,  4,  26,  266,  358 

early  life,  27 

in  Barbadoes,  27,  28,  41 

in  Boston,  28-29,  65 

grandmother  of  Sophia  Hume,  300 
Fiske,  John — 

on  Quakerism,  35 

on  Flushing  remonstrance,  224 
Fitsrandal,  Nathaniel,  on  tithes,  154 
Fitts,  Jonathan,  299 
Fitzwater,  Thomas,  383 
Fletcher,  Benjamin,  481,  488 
Flower,  Enoch,  527 
Flushing — 

Lynn  Anabaptists  come  to,  217 

Quaker  persecution  in,  223,  227 

protest  for  liberty  of  conscience  in, 
223-225,  228 

Quakers  in,  225,  360 

John  Bowne  of,  227 

Half-year's  Meeting  in,  234,  235 

Yearly  Meeting  in,  239,  246  n. 

Monthly  Meeting  in,  246,  247 
Forby,  Benjamin,  274 
Foster,  Lydia,  233 
Fothergill,  John — 

travels  in  New  England,  127 

in  American  colonies,  392,  410 
Fothergill,   Dr.  John,  411,  460,   492, 

564 
Fothergill,  Samuel — 

in  Nantucket,  127 

and  the  "Great  Awakening,"   128- 
129 

travels  in  New  England,  128-130 

in  Georgia,  300  ». 

in  Maryland,  322 

in  New  Jersey,  410,  411 

in  Pennsylvania,  523 

and  reviving  of  Discipline,  411 
Foulke,  Samuel,  404 
Fowler,  John,  146  «. 
Fowler,     Robert,    builds    the    Wood- 
house,  46,  219 


588      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Fox,  George,  xiii,  25,  30,  455 

Epistles  of,  xiv,  44,  78,  229  n. ,  417, 

438-  456 

proposes  business  meetings,  373 
has  a  sense  of  Quaker  executions,  90 
in  Barbadoes,  in,  510 
letter  to  Governor,  in 
in  Jamaica,  112 
in  Rhode  Island,  112-113 
at  Providence,  114 
collision  with  Roger  Williams,  114- 

118 
suggests  keeping  of  Records,  141  n. , 

229  n. 

in  Long  Island,  230 
in   Maryland,   281,    282,   287,   288, 

3°3-  337 

in  Virginia,  282,  283,  287,  306 
in  North  Carolina,  283,  285-287,  339 
epistle  to  South  Carolina,  299 
in  New  Jersey,  359-361,  372 
in  Germany,  442,  446 
colonial  missionary  work  of,  288,  303 

Fox,  Margaret,  314 

Franklin,  Benjamin,  467,  524 
proposes  union  of  Colonies,  209 
in  Pennsylvanian  politics,  491,  493, 

506,  507,  556,  557,  561 
and  Free  Quakers,  570 

Franklin,  Matthew,  257 

Franklin,  Thomas,  257 

Fuller,  William,  267 

Fundamental     Constitution     for     the 
Carolinas,  321,  339,  364,  471 

Galloway,  Anne,  294,  310,  314 
Gardiner,  Richard  and  wife,  123 
Gardiner,  Thomas — 

meeting  in  house  of,  373,  376 

minister,  379 

Gardiner,  Thomas,  jun. ,  386 
Gardner,  George,  69  n. 
Gartrite,  Ephrim,  319  n. 
Gary,  Alice,  314,  331  «. 
Gary,  John,  282  n. 
Gaskin,  Samuel,  69  «. 
Gaspte,  burning  of,  211,  212  «. 
George  I. ,  decision  on  tithes,  155 
Georgia,  Quakers  in,  298,  300  ». 
Gibbons,  Sarah — 

comes  to  Boston,  36,  39 

returns  to  Boston,  46,  47,  73 

lands  first  in  New  York,  51,  220 

in  Scituate,  61 

in  Barbadoes,  70  n. 

in  Salem,  73 

in  John  Norton's  church,  108  n. 

in  Long  Island,  221 
Gifford,  Joseph,  147  n. 
Gildersleeve,  Richard,  228  «. 


Gill,  Roger,  237,  291,  389 

dies  of  yellow  fever,  390 
Gilpin,  Thomas,  567 
Godby,  Ann — 

trial  of,  275 

becomes  Quaker,  275 
Goldsmith,  Ralph,  94,  97 
Gookin,  Charles,  488 
Gordon,  Robert,  453 
Gordon,  William,  350 
Gorges,  Sir  Ferdinando,  340 
Gorton,  Samuel — 

corresponds  with  early  Quakers,  38- 

39 

views  of,  120-121 
Gould,  Daniel,  176  «.,  331  «. 
in  Boston,  80 
a  prisoner,  85  n. 
in  Virginia,  280 
Gould,  John,  176  n. 
Gould,  Stephen,  180  n. 
Gouldney,  Henry,  448  n. 
Government — 

Quaker  experiment  in  Rhode  Island, 

xvi,  171-212 

in  Pennsylvania,  xvi,  357,  418, 
425.  43ii  462-474,  475-479. 
493.  S46 

in  Carolinas,  xvi,  339-353,  462 
Governors,  Quaker — 

William  Coddington,  23,  172,  179, 

181 

William  Coddington,  jun. ,  192 
Nicholas  Easton,  24  n.  ,112,  174,177 
Walter  Clarke,    185  «.,    188,    189, 

192,  197 

Henry  Bull,  192,  195 
John  Easton,  195 
Caleb  Carr,  197 
John  Wanton,  202-204 
Gideon  Wanton,  204 
Stephen  Hopkins,  164,  209 
John  Archdale,  328,  348 
Thomas  Harvey,  344,  350 
Robert  Barclay,  368 
Samuel  Jenings,  379,  381 
John  Skein,  379 
Thomas  Olive,  379 
William  Penn,  419,  478 
Grace,  Covenant  of,  9-14,  17,  18 

preachers  of,  7,  8 
Gravesend — 

Lynn  Anabaptists  come  to,  217 
Quakers  in,  221,  225  n. ,  360 
Greene,  Nathanael,    "disowned"   for 

taking  arms,  151 
Griffith,  John,  544 

travels  in  New  York,  239-240 
in  Pennsylvania,  523,  525,  532 
Grimball,  Paul,  345 


INDEX 


589 


Haddon,  Elizabeth,  388,  389 

H addon,  John,  389 

Hallett,  William,  218 

Hamilton,  Andrew,  468,  486,  488 

Harnet,  Edward,  69  n. 

Harper,  Robert,  80 

Harpswell  (see  North  Yarmouth),  132 

Harris,  Elizabeth — 

came  to  Maryland  4  ».,  266,  267, 

276.  329.  358 

not  in  Virginia,  266,  268 

work  in  England,  266  n. 

appears  as  a  "sign,"  266  «. 
Harris,  Thomas — 

comes  to  New  England,  61  n.,  70 

in  Barbadoes,  70  n. 

persecution  of,  70 
Harris,  William,  180,  181  n. 
Harrison,  James,  434 
Harrison,  Richard,  310 
Hart,    Edward,    signs    Flushing     re 
monstrance,  223 
Hartshorne,  Richard,  360,  365 

Quaker  minister,  379 
Harvey,  Thomas,  Governor  of  North 

Carolina,  344,  350 
Hatherly,  Timothy,  befriends  Quakers, 

61" 

Haviland,  Nicholas,  149 
Hawett,  William,  345 
Hazard,  Thomas,  opposes  slavery,  157, 

158,  159,  165 
Head,  Peter,  41,  43 
Heald,  Robert,  254  n. 
Heckewelder,  John,  497 
Heferman,  William,  114  ». 
Helmont,  Van,  419  «.,  446 
Hempstead — 

Lynn  Anabaptists  come  to,  217 

Robert  Hodgson  in,  221,  222 
Henry,  Patrick,  211,  318,  338 
Hicks,  Thomas,  235 
Higginson,  Francis,  29 
Hobby,  Remington,  starts  meeting  in 

Vassal  borough,  135 
Hodgson,  Robert — 

goes  to  Boston,  47,  48 

lands  first  in  New  York,  51,  219 

in  Barbadoes,  70  «. 

persecution     in     Hempstead,     221, 
222 

in  Virginia,  273 

in  Maryland,  278 
Holder,  Christopher — 

comes  to  Boston,  36 

returns  to  Boston,  46,  47,  57,  75 

in  Sandwich,  57-60 

in  Salem,  65-66 

imprisoned,  etc.,  66,  67 

issues  Declaration  of  Faith,  67 


Holder,  Christopher  (contd. ) — 

suffers  ear-cropping,  75 

marries  Mary  Scott,  75 

banished,  80 

in  England,  90 

in  Long  Island,  230 

in  Virginia,  273 

in  Maryland,  278 
Hollingsworth,  William,  336 
Hooton,  Elizabeth — 

released-from  Boston  prison,  94 

earlier  life,  105 

persecutions  of,  106-107 

at     Governor     Endicott's     funeral, 
107  n. 

in  Barbadoes,  in 

dies  in  Jamaica,  107  n.,  112 

in  Virginia,  274  n. 
Hopkins,  Stephen — 

Governor    of    Rhode    Island,    164, 
209 

"disowned"    for   holding  a  slave, 
165,  212 

early  history,  208 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  208-209 

intercolonial  service,  209-212 

opposes  taxation  without  representa 
tion,  209-211 

signs  Declaration  of  Independence, 

212 

Horsey,  Stephen,  335-337 
Hoskens,  Jane,  525 
Howe,  Sir  William,  152,  412,  566 
Hoxie,  Stephen,  165 
Hubberthorne,  Richard,  144 
Huddestone,  Peleg,  149 
Huguenots,    in  South   Carolina,    347, 

348 
Hull,  John,  in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica, 

III,   112 

Hume,  Sophia — 

granddaughter  of  Mary  Fisher,  300 

book  of,  300,  301 
Humphries,  John,  572 
Hunt,  John,  567 
Hussey,   Christopher,   a   purchaser  of 

Nantucket,  123 

Hussey,  Stephen,  becomes  Quaker  in 
Barbadoes   and   returns   to  Nan- 
tucket,  123 
Hutchinson,  Anne,  63,  192  n. 

life,  4-7,  25  ». 

holds  "women's  meetings,"  6 

precipitates  Antinomian  controversy, 
8-10 

trial  before  court,  16-20 

sentenced  to  exile,  20 

goes  to  Rhode  Island,  21 
Hutchinson,  Edward,  12 
Hutchinson,  William,  4,  25  n. 


590      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Indians — 

Quakers  and,  in  Rhode  Island,  i75». , 

189 

in  New  Jersey,  367,  401-404 
in  Pennsylvania,  419,  433,  468,  489, 

491-493,  495-507 
treatment  in  Carolinas,  347,  348 
meeting  with,  230,  281,  377,  402, 

435-  498 

John  Woolman  visits,  404-407 
conferences  of,  396,  402,  503,  504 
light  of  Christ  in,  286,  498 
"walking  purchase,"  489,  501-503 
reservations  for,  402,  403 
Moravians  and,  498,  506 
New  Jersey  Association  for  Helping, 

4°3 
Friendly  Association,  etc.,  503,  504, 

5°7 
Intoxicants — 

law  against  selling   proposed,    113, 

3" 

regulation  of  traffic  in  South  Carolina, 

348 
Quaker  views  on  use  of,   148,  311, 

53°.  SSL  576-578 
selling  to  Indians,   440,    476,    496, 

499-Soi-  53° 
Inward      light,     xvi-xviii,    xxiv-xxvii, 

32-36 
Inyon,  John,  249 

Jaffray,  Alexander,  369 
Jamaica,  26 

Quakers  in,  43,  44 

visitors  to,  112,  281 

minute  to  Quakers  in,  248 
Jamaica  (New  York) — 

Lynn  Anabaptists  come  to,  217 

Quakers  in,  221 
James  II.,  432,  481 

withdraws  Rhode  Island  Charter,  192 

grants  Pennsylvania  to  William  Penn, 

418,  419 

James  &  Drinker,  561 
Jamestown,  Virginia,  272 
Jay,  John,  360 
Jenings,  Samuel,  237,  434 

Deputy  Governor,  380 

Governor  of  West  Jersey,  379,  381, 
386 

in  New  Jersey  politics,  381,  383,  384 

in  Keith  controversy,  383,  450,  451, 

453 

tribute  to,  384 

meeting  in  house  of,  387 
Jenner,  Obedience,  313 
Jennings,  John,  299 
Jersey,  East  (see  also  New  Jersey) — 

granted  to  Sir  G.  Carteret,  363,  365 


Jersey,  East  (contd. ) — 
sold  to  Quakers,  368 
Council  of  Proprietors,  368 
Scotch  in,  369 
Governor  of,  368 

compared  with   West  Jersey,    377- 
379-  386 

Jersey,  West — 

sold  to  Quakers,  363 
early  difficulties  in,  363,  364 
Quaker  settlements  in,  365-368 
number  of  Quakers  in,  368,  377  «. 
Quaker  ministers  in,  379 
Council  of  Proprietors,  368 
compared  with  East  Jersey,  377-379, 
386 

John,  James,  293 

John  ap  John,  442 

Johns,  Elizabeth,  326 

Johns,  Richard,  in  politics,  332-333 

Johnson,  George,  336-337 

Johnson,  Robert,  572 

Jones,  Griffith,  429 

Jordan,  Robert,  317 

Jordan,  Thomas,  317 

Judkins,  Obadiah,  313 

Jury- 
rights  of,  235 
to  determine  seditious  character  of  a 

paper,  451 
in  trial  of  Indians,  175  «. ,  496 

Keddy,  Stephen,  290 

Keith,  George,  293,  540 
opposes  Samuel  Bownas,  234,  392 
early  life,  369,  445 
runs  Province  Line,  369,  370,  446 
master  at  Penn  Charter  school,  369, 

370,  446,  527 
settles  in  New  Jersey,  369 
in  Philadelphia,  370 
schism  of,  370,  379,  446-452,  481 
doctrinal  views,  452,  455,  458 
disowned,  370,  383,  452,  453 
joins  Established  Church,  454 
and   Christian  Quakers,   370,   449, 

45°.  454 

establishes     Episcopal     Church     in 
Jerseys,  etc.,  370,  383,  392,  454, 

455 

writings  of,  450,  452,  456-458 
Keithians,    481,     511    (see    Christian 

Quakers). 

Kempthorn,  Simon,  28 
Kennebec  County,  Quakers  in,  133-135 
Kenny,  John,  150  ». 
King,  William,  in  Boston,  80 
Kinsey,  John,  546 

in   Pennsylvania  politics,  488,  490, 

49L  493.  557.  57i 


INDEX 


59i 


Knollys,  Hansard,  preacher  in  Dover, 

104 
Kuton,  William,  309 

Lancaster,  James — 

in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica,  in,  112 

in  Rhode  Island,  112 

in  Long  Island,  230 

in  Virginia,  282 
Lapham,  Thomas,  jun. ,  165 
Lawrence,  Daniel,  249  n. 
Lawrence,  Elizabeth,  314 
Lawrence,  Robert,  317 
Lawrence,  William,  wife  of,  218  «. 
Lawrie,  Gawen,  364,  365,  380 

Deputy-Governor  of  East  Jersey,  368 
Laws — 

on  militia  in  Rhode  Island,  190-191 

on  militia  in  Virginia,  318-320 
Laws,  anti-Quaker — 

in  Boston,  40,  66  n.,  70,  76,   101, 
103,  no  n. 

in  Plymouth  Colony,  59  n. 

"looked   in  the  face,"  79,  80,   87, 
102 

in  New  Netherlands,  223 

in  Virginia,  269-272 
Laws,  anti-slavery,  158  ».,  165  «.,  510, 

520 
Lawton,  Isaac,  165 

master  of  Quaker  school,  167 
Lay,  Benjamin,  516 
Lay-religion,  xxx-xxxii 
Lead,  John,  319  n. 
Leddra,  William — 

citizen  of  Barbadoes,  41,  87 

comes  to  New  England,  61  n. ,  70 

in  Barbadoes,  70  ». 

banished,  88 

executed,  88,  89,  96 

dying  testimony,  88 
Leeds,  Daniel — 

printer,  370 

"Allmanack"  suppressed,  370 

in  Keith  controversy,  379,  388 
Lenthall,  Mr.,  24 
Leverett,  Thomas,  16 
Liberty  of  conscience,  xx,  xxi 

first  announced  in  New  World,  21  n. 

in  Declaration  of  Breda,  100 

in  Rhode  Island,  23,  52,  55,  171, 
191,  466 

in  Plymouth  Colony,  61  «. 

in  Providence,  21  n. ,  63 

in  New  Netherlands,  215,  228 

in  Flushing,  Long  Island,  223-225 

for  Virginia,  272,  318 

in  Maryland,  276  n. 

in  North  Carolina,  320,  338,  339, 
349.  350-353 


Liberty  of  conscience  (contd. ) — 

in  New  Jersey,  364,  365 

in  Pennsylvania,  420,  441,  464,  465, 

473-  476,  569 
Liddal,  John,  274  n. 
Lightfoot,  William,  572 
Literature,  Quaker,  544-546 
Little  Egg  Harbour,  388 
Lloyd,  Charles,  442 
Lloyd,  David,  429,  433,  546 

in  Pennsylvania  politics,  484,   489, 

S7i 
Lloyd,  Thomas,  425,  435,  441,  442, 

522,  527,  571 

Deputy-Governor,  448,  479,  480 
and  George  Keith,  448,  452, 453, 481 
Locke,  John,  321,  339,  364,  365,  471 
Lockwood,  Garsham,  233 
Loddwick,  Christian,  to  have  school  in 

Newport,  166 

Logan,  James,  427,  522,  546 
acknowledgment  of,  393 
in  Pennsylvania  politics,  483,  488, 

489,  490,  507,  571 
and  Indians,  501 
and  war,  556,  570 
Logan,  William,  492 
Long  Island — 

Quakers  in,  belong  to  New  England 

Yearly  Meeting,  144,  229  ».,  246 

set  off  as  separate  Yearly  Meeting, 

144  n. ,  229  n. ,  246 
Anabaptists  in,  216-219 
migrations  from  Lynn  to,  217,  223, 

224 

visitors  in,  225,  229,  230-240 
number  of  Quakers,  xvi,  225 
Quaker  divisions  in,  229  n. ,  438 
Ranters  in,  230-234,  247,  248 
denominations  in,  234 
type  of  Quakerism  in,  243-244 
organisation  of  Quakerism  in,  244- 

254 
Lotteries — 

Quaker  views  on,  147,  476 

in  Pennsylvania,  556 
Lowe,  Emanuel,  344,  352 
Lower,  Thomas,  429 
Lucas,  Nicholas,  364,  365 
Lynch,  Charles,  296 

in  politics,  337,  338 

disowned,  338 
Lynn — 

Seekers  in,  65 

business  meetings  in,  141-144  «. 

Lady  Moody  in,  65,  216 

Anabaptists  in,  65,  216,  217 

migrations  from,   to  Long    Island, 
217,  223,  224 

number  of  Quakers  in,  xvi 


592      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Macy,  Thomas,  123 

Maine — 

first  Quakers  in,  103,  104,  130 
development  of  Quakerism   in,   xv, 

130-134 

whipping  of  Quakers  in,  130 

John  Archdale,  agent  for  Governor 

of,  340 

Malins,  Robert,  79  ». 
Mallins,  Mary,  94 
Marbury,  Francis,  4 
Markham,  William — 

sent  to  lay  out  Philadelphia,  419 

Deputy-Governor,  528 
Marriage — 

Quaker   views   on,  xxiv,   147,    249, 
312,  313,  547 

Quaker,  legal,  147,  249  n. ,  548 

Quaker,  not  legal,  290 

regulations  in  New  Jersey,  386,  387 

certificates  on  account  of,  373-375 

Quaker  ceremony  for,  547 
Marsh,  Sarah,  331  n. 
Marshall,  Christopher,  30 
Marshall,  Humphrey,  467 
Maryland — 

Elizabeth  Harris  visits,  4  «. ,   266, 
267,  268,  276,  329,  358 

Quaker   visitors    to,   276,   278-282, 
287-288,  290-295 

ordinance  of  toleration  in,  276  n. 

Quaker  persecution  in,  276-280 

number  of  Quakers  in,  xvi,  278,  282 

migrations    from    Pennsylvania   to, 
295,  296 

Yearly  Meeting  in,   281,  288,  293, 

303-  3°4.  311 
Half-year's  Meeting,  282,  305,  309, 

315,  321  n. 
business    meetings   organised,    303- 

306 

slavery  in,  321-325 
Quakers  in  politics  of,  329-334 
Maspeth,  religious  freedom   promised 

in,  215  n. 
Massachusetts — 

first  citizen  of  to  join  Quakers,  41 
spread  of  Quakerism  in,  xv,  62 
exempts  Quakers  from  tithes,   155- 

156 

anti-slavery  laws,  165 
Rhode  Island  annexed  to,  192 
Church  uniformity  in,  35,  265,  317 
political    relations    with     England, 

100,  loi,  196 
Quakers  without  franchise  in,  xv 

Massey,  Isaac,  572 

Massey,  Thomas,  572 

Mather,  Cotton,  5,  31  «.,  59,  64 
and  G.  Keith,  448 


Matiniconk,  361  n. 

revenues  from,  to   maintain  school, 
407 

Island  Managers  of,  407 
Matthews,  Margaret,  547 
Mayo,  Edward,  299 
Mead,  William,  429 
Meares,  Thomas,  277 

in  politics,  230 
Meeting  for  sufferings — 

established  in  New  England,  151 

established  in  New  York,  259 

distributes  relief,  152,  259 

parliamentary    agent    of    London, 
207  n. 

of  New  York  petitions  Governor  for 
abolition  of  slaves,  258 

of  New  York  during  Revolutionary 
War,  259-260 

in  Philadelphia,  408,  411,  545,  554, 

555.  569 
Meeting  for  Worship — 

type  of  meeting,  xxii,  34,   137-139, 

243 

first  held  in  private  houses,  99,  102, 
126,  137,  140,   141  «.,  143,  179, 

222,     227,     274,     302,     306,     331, 

339.  372.  373.  376.  443 
central  feature  of  Quakerism,   136, 

242,  243,  302 

sometimes  called  a  Church,  137  n. 
ministry  in,  xxii,  138,  544 
Meeting,  Women's,  6,  7 
in  New  England,  245 
in  Maryland,    281,    305,   308,    312, 

313,  314,  321  n. 
in  Virginia,  283 
in  New  Jersey,  387 
in  Pennsylvania,  437,  539 
Meetings,  business — 

underlying  feature  of,  140-141 
social  value  of,  143,  314,  315 
records  of,  141  n. ,  244,  304,  307, 

439 

correspondence  between,  313,  314 
proposed  by  George  Fox,  373 
organised  in  New  England,  140-145 

in  New  York,  244-254 

in  Virginia,  280,  283,  285,   303, 

306,  307 

in  Maryland,  281,  303-306 

in  North  Carolina,  296,  297,  299, 

307,  308 

in  New  Jersey,  372-377.  39*-393 
in  Pennsylvania,  437-440 
Meetings,  Monthly — 

in  New  England,  141  «. 

in  New  York,  246,  247,  250-252 

in  Maryland,  305 

in  Virginia,  306,  307 


INDEX 


593 


Meetings,  Monthly  (contd.) — 

in  North  Carolina,  296,  297,  307,  308 

in  South  Carolina,  308  «. 

in  New  Jersey,  372,  373,  376  ». 

in  Pennsylvania,  434,  534 

business  of,  145-147,  247-250,  305, 
308-310,  316,  440,  538 

postponed  for  fairs,  378 
Meetings,  Preparative — 

in  New  York,  251 

in  Pennsylvania,  534,  535 
Meetings,  Quarterly — 

business  of,  142,  247-250,  393 

in  New  England,  142  ». ,  143  n. 

in  New  York,  237,  246,  250-251 

in  New  Jersey,  376 

in    Pennsylvania,    437,     440,    535, 

571-573 
Meetings,  Quarterly  for  Ministers — 

in  New  York,  253 

in  Maryland,  305 

in  Virginia,  307 

in  North  Carolina,  307 

in  New  Jersey,  409 

in  Pennsylvania,  539 
Megapolensis,  J.,  218,  220,  225 
Mennonites — 

and  slavery,  395 

in  Pennsylvania,  422,  441,  442 
Merryconege  Neck — 

Quakers  in,  132 
Metier,  Thomas,  572 
Miars,    Elizabeth,    in   Barbadoes  and 

Jamaica,  in,  112 
Middleton,  Thomas,  226 
Middletown,  360,  365,  379 
Millard,  Jane,  274  ». 
Mills,  Sarah,  130 

Mifflin,  Thomas,  561,  562,  565,  568 
Mifflin,  Warner,  326,  574 
Ministers,  Quaker — 

number  visiting  Nantucket,  127  n. 

influence    of    travelling,    139,    140, 

2S2.  3i5.  379.  54<> 
business  meetings  for,  145  n.,   253, 

387.    388,    389,    409,   439,    449, 

451.  538,  539 
in  West  Jersey,  379 
in  Burlington  Quarterly  Meeting,  409 
in  Pennsylvania  and  George  Keith, 

449 

visiting  Pennsylvania,  540-543 

recording  of,  254  n. ,  450,  538 

paying  of,  xiii,  456,  544 

in  politics,  451 
Ministry,  Quaker — 

type  of,  xxii,  xxv,  xxvi,  138,  544 

weakness  of,  252-253 
Moody,  Lady  Deborah,  65 

prepares  Long  Island  forQuakers,  2 16 


Moody,  Lady  Deborah  (contd.  )- 

story  of,  216-217 

becomes  Quaker,  222 

meeting  in  house  of,  222 
Moon,  James,  520  n. 
Moravians,  498,  506 
More's,  Thomas,  Utopia,  471 
Morris,  Robert,  568 
Mott,  Adam,  53  n. 
Miinster,  and  Quakers,  30,  31,  71  n. 
Mystics,  Germantown,  370,  379 

Nansemond,  282,  295  n.,  306,  307  n. 
Nantucket — 

Quakerism  in,  123-127,  215 

whaling  in,  127  n. 

population  of,  127  n. ,  297 

migrations  to  South,  295-298 
Narragansett — 

Quakerism  in,  xv,  114 

slavery  in,  156 

encroachment  of  Connecticut,  190 
Nayler,  James,  30,  121  ». ,  419  «. 
Neale,  Mary,  300 

Needham,  Anthony,  and  wife,  69  n. 
New  Amsterdam,   51   (see  New  York 

City) 

Newark,  358 
Newberry,  Walter — 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  192,  193, 
197 

meeting  in  house  of,  246  «. 
Newby,  Gabriel,  292 
Newby,  Nathan,  292 
New  Castle,  358 

William  Penn  lands  at,  376 
New  England's  Ensign,  36  n. ,  48,  90 
New  England  Judged,  91 
New  Garden,  323 

settlement  of,  297 
Newhouse,  Thomas,  breaks  bottles  in 

a  church,  108 
New  Jersey — 

migrations  to  the  South  from,  296 

migrations  to  the  West,  408 

earliest  settlements  in,  358,  359 

granted  by  Duke  of  York  to  two 
proprietors,  362 

division  of,  363 

origin  of  name,  362 

first  Assembly,  362 

Charter  of,  364,  365 

freedom  in,  364,  365,  382 

William  Penn  in,  363-365,  368, 
418 

Province  Line  drawn,  370 

Council  of  Proprietors  surrenders 
rights  to  Queen  Anne,  368,  382, 
402 

Quaker  Meetings  in,  372-377,  390 

2  Q 


594      QUAKERS  IN   AMERICAN  COLONIES 


New  Jersey  (contd. ) — 

united  under  Lord  Cornbury,  382 
Quaker  influence  in,  377,  379 
Quakers  in  politics  of,  xv,  363,  379, 

380-383,  384,  385,  386,  462 
lawyers,  etc.,  in,  386 
list  of  meeting-houses  in,  392 
Quakers  and  war  in,  392-394,  411- 

413 

slavery  in,  395,  397 

Quaker  education  in,  407,  408 

number  of  Quakers  in,  xvi 
New  Netherland  (see  New  York),  re 
ligious  freedom  in,  215,  228 
Newport — 

first  settlement  in,  22-25 

Quaker  Meetings  in,  137 

number  of  Quakers  in,  xv,  201 

Yearly  Meeting    in,    54,    112,    127, 
144,  160-163,  S^o 

local  business  meeting  in,  141 

Quaker  School  in,  166 
Newtown  (N.J. ),  376  n. 
Newtown  (N.Y. ),  237,  239,  247 
New  York — 

Dutch  war  in,  174,  178,  228,  229 

English  conquest  of,  362 

defence    demanded    for,    196-197, 

393 
growth  and  decline  of  Quakers  in, 

xvi,  225,  241,  261 
meetings  in,  236,  240,  246-252 
Established  Church  in,  392 
Quakers  and  slavery  in,  255-258 
Quakers  and  education  in,  261,  262 
Quaker   persecution    in,    220,    221, 
223,  225  n. ,  227,   228,  234-236, 
265 

New  York  City- 
landing  of  first  Quakers  in,  219,  220 
meetings  in,  230,  231,  237,  239 
Quaker  School  in,  261-262 
number  of  Quakers  in,  xvi,  262  «. 

Nicholas,  Jonathan,  210 

Nicholson,  Christopher,  339 

Nicholson,  Joseph — 

goes  to  New  England,  49 
imprisoned,  89  n. 
book  written  by,  90 
in  Virginia,  274  n. 

Nicholson,  Samuel,  meeting  in  house 
of,  372 

Norris,    Isaac,    428,    434,    489,    545, 

546,  57i 

Norris,  Isaac,  2nd,  493,  557 
Norton,  Humphrey — 

goes  to  Boston,  47,  57,  71,  76 
writes  New  England's  Ensign,  48, 

90 
conversion,  52 


Norton,  Humphrey  (contd.) — 

in  Plymouth  Colony,  60-62 

in  New  Haven,  61 

in  Virginia,  273 
Norton,  John — 

and  early  Quakers,  37,  71 

to  visit  prisoners,  84  n. 

guardian  of  orthodoxy,  too 
Nottingham,  Samuel,  254 
Nowland,  John,  meeting  in  house  of, 
137 

Oaths — 

Quaker  views  on,  149,  169 
in  Rhode  Island,  192  n. ,  198 
Quakers  refuse,  in  Maryland,   277, 

278 

Quakers  petition  against,   in  Mary 
land,  331-333 
Quakers  and,  in  Virginia,  334,  335, 

337,  344  n. 
in  Carolinas,    338,  344  n. ,  345, 

346  ».,  351,  352,  353 
not  required  in  New  Jersey,  381-382 
in  Pennsylvania,  471-472,  477 
Olive,  Thomas,  380,  434 

Governor  of  West  Jersey,  379 
in  New  Jersey  politics,  385 
Opequan,  296 
Overseers — 

in  New  England,  146 

in  Pennsylvania,  Monthly  Meetings, 

534.  539.  564 
Owen,  Griffith,  435 
Oxley,  Joseph,  523,  532 
Oyster  Bay — 

Lynn  Anabaptists  come  to,  217 
Half-year's   Meeting   at,   229,   230, 
246 

Palmer,  Major,  293 
Pantisocracy,  358 
Partridge,  Richard — 

foreign    agent    for    Rhode    Island, 
205-207 

parliamentary    agent    for     London 
Meeting  for  Sufferings,  207  n. 

petitions  against  tithes,  155 
Partridge,  William,  203 
Parvin,  Benjamin,  404 
Pastorius,    Francis  Daniel,   441,   442, 

452 

and  slavery,  441,  511 
"  Primmer"  of,  545 
Pattison,  George — 
in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica,  111-112 
in  Rhode  Island,  112 
travels  in  New  England,  120 
in  Virginia,  282 


INDEX 


595 


Patuxent,   277,    281,    283,   287,    289, 

305 

"  Paxton  Boys,"  raid  of,  505-508,  557 
Peachy,  William,  379 
Pearson,  Peter,  79  n. 

released  from  Boston  prison,  95 

whipping  of,  102 
Peasley,  Mary,  300 
Peckover,  Edmund — 

in  Nantucket,  126 

in  Maine,  131 

in  Long  Island,  239 

in  Southern  Colonies,  294,  295 

in  Burlington,  408 

Pemberton,  Israel,  404,  503,  506,  567 
Pemberton,  James,  558,  560 
Pemberton,  John,  404,  547 
Pembroke  (see  Duxbury) 
Penington,  Isaac,  571 
Penn,   Hannah  Callowhill,  424,   485, 

486 

Penn,  John,  505,  507 
Penn,  Thomas,  489,  501,  505,  556 
Penn,  William — 

in  Germany,  422,  442,  446 

George  Fox  visits,  361,  364 

and  Mead,  trial  of,  235  n. 

proprietor  in  West  Jersey,  364,  365, 
378,  380,  418 

proprietor  in  East  Jersey,  368 

and   John    Locke  write  charter  for 
Carolina,  364,  430 

receives  grant  of  Pennsylvania,  418 

lands  at  New  Castle,  376,  420 

Governor  of  Pennsylvania,  419,  478 

and  Pennsylvania  politics,  462-474, 

57i 

and  Indians,  401,   419,   420,   433, 

468,  495 
and  slaves,  510 
character  and  work  in  Pennsylvania, 

423-436,  462-474,  476,   481-483, 

485 

and  George  Keith,  454 
writings,  423,  427,  430 
ministry  of,  427,  428 
Penn  Charter  school,   369,   370,  446, 

504,  527,  528 

at  time  of  Revolution,  575,  576 
Pennsylvania — 

granted  to  William  Penn,  418,  419 
immigrants  into,  420-422,  440-444, 

494 

charter  of,  476,  478,  482,  487,  562 
first  Assembly,  420,  440,  464,  475 
deputy-governors  of,  424,  425,  479- 

481 

division  into  counties,  440 
raid  of  "  Paxton  Boys,"  505-508 
size  of,  419 


Pennsylvania  (contd.) — 

prosperity  of,    467,   468,   470,  485- 

489 

migrations  from  to  South,  295,  296 
History  of,  546 
Quakers    in    politics    of,    xv,    459, 

47S-494i  556-558 

capital  punishment  in,  472,  473,  486 
education  in,    440,    441,    558,   574- 

576 

oaths  in,  471,  472,  486,  492 
Indians   in,    419,    433,    468,    489, 

491-493,  495-507 
slavery  in,  510-521 
Quakers  and  war  in,  424,  425,  426, 

468-470,  477,  478,  480,  488-493 
Quakers  and  education  in,  527-530, 

558,  571 

Quaker  meetings  in,  443 
business  meetings  in,  437-441 
number   of  Quakers   in,    xvi,    522- 

524 

State  religion  of,  524 
Quakers  and  the  Revolution  in,  562- 

568 

Pequot  War,  21  n. 
Percevall,  Andrew,  298 
Perkins,  Robert,  291 
Perrot,  John — 
goes  to  Rome,  267  n. ,  275 
leader  of  a  schism  in  Virginia,  275- 

276,  302  n. 
Perry,  John,  572 
Persecution,  Quaker — 

causes  for,  29-32,  92,  93,  100,  265, 

279.  317 

lists  of,  41,  91,  278 
results  of,  357,  417,  418 
unsettles   sanity   of  some   Quakers, 

108 

end  of,  in  New  England,  no  «. 
in   New   England,    28,    37-40,    45, 

57-6l,   66-89,   90-97,    IOI-IIO 

in  New  York,  220,  221,  223,  225  n., 
227,  228,  234-236 

in  Virginia,   269-273,    274,   276  »., 
290,  317 

in  Maryland,  276-280 

in  England,  417 

in  Wales,  442 

in  Pennsylvania,  566,  567,  568,  569 
Peters,  Hugh,  8,  17,  18,  172 
Peyton,  Catherine,  300 
Phelps,  Jonathan,  308 
Phelps,  Nicholas,  69  n. 

banished  from  Salem,  77 

in  England,  90 

death  of,  102 
Philadelphia — 

yellow  fever  in,  389 


596     QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Philadelphia  (contd. ) — 

William  Markham  sent  to  lay  out, 
419 

size  of,  468,  522 

William  Perm  lands  at,  420,  421 

General  Meeting  in,  391,  437,  444 

meetings  in,  421,  443,  522,  523 

Monthly  Meeting  in,  434,  437,  439 

Yearly  Meeting  in,  391,  437 

Penn  Charter  school  in,   369,   370, 

446,  504,  527-528,  574-576 
Philips,  Catherine,  300 
Philip's  War,  King,  121,  181-189 
Phillips,  Henry,  284 
Phillips,  Thomas,  248 
Phipps,  Sir  William,  196 
Pierson,  Abraham,  359 
Pinder,  Richard,  44 
Piscataqua — 

Quakers  in,  xv,  103,  104,  119,  122, 
130 

Yearly  Meeting  in,  144  «. 
Piscataway,  358 
Pitt,  John,  313 
Plato's  Republic,  471 
Pleasants,  Thomas,  316,  319  n. 
Plymouth  Colony — 

Seekers  in,  57  n. 

Quakers  in,  57-62,  72 

religious  freedom  in,  61  «. 

tithes  in,  193  n. 
Pope,  Joseph,  and  wife,  69  n. 
Porter,  Edmund,  351 
Porter,  John,  jun. ,  274,  275 

Quaker  minister,  275,  335 

in  politics,  335 
Porter,    John,    sen.,    turned    out    of 

politics  in  Virginia,  334 
Porter,  John,  of  North  Carolina,  352 
Portland  (see  Falmouth),  130 
Portsmouth — 

colony  of,  22,  23,  25 

united  with  Newport,  172 

united  with  Providence  and  Warwick, 
172 

forerunners  of  Quakers  in,  251 

Quaker  school  in,  167 
Preston,  George,  goes  to  Dover,  etc., 

103,  104 

Preston,  Richard,  276  n. 
Price,  Thomas,  336 
Prince,  Mary — 

comes  to  Boston,  36-39 

in  the  east,  46  n. 
Prior,  Edmund,  259  n. 
Prior,  Matthew,  249,  250 
Proud,  Robert,  546 
Providence  Colony — 

founded  by  Roger  Williams,  21  ». 
liberty  of  conscience  in,  21  ».,  63 


Providence  Colony  (contd.)— 

Quakers  in,  63 

Yearly  Meeting  in,  144  n. 

Quaker  school  in,  167  n. 

becomes  part  of  Rhode  Island,  172 

internal  strife  in,  180-181 

burned  in  Indian  War,  188 

growth  of,  201-209 

proposes  Continental  Congress,  211 
Puritans,  xx-xxii 
Pusey,  Caleb,  388,  497,  546 
Pyott,  Edward,  77 

Quaker  saints,  xxix-xxx 

Quakerism,  English  and  American,  xiii 
central  truth,  xvi-xviii,  32-36  • 
mystical  element  of,  129,  136,  168, 

242,  243, 395 

divine  movings,  80,  81,  87,  89 
source  of  power   in  New  England, 

134.  135 

meeting,  central  feature  of,  136,  243, 
minor  testimonies  of,  xxiii,  xxiv,  169, 

170,  248-249,  312,  534,  572,  573. 
Keith  controversy  and  Pennsylvania, 

456-  457 

effect  of  Revolution  on,  in  New  York, 
259-262 

effect  of  Revolution  on,  in  Phila 
delphia  Yearly  Meeting,  408,  519, 
570-580 

to  be  prevailing  type  of  religion,  xiv,. 
xxii 

causes  for  decline  of,  xxii-xxix 
Quakers — 

forerunners  of,  xix,  134,  135,  215. 
in  Rhode  Island,  23-25,  53 
in  Plymouth  colony,  57  n.,  215 
in  Salem,  64,  65,  69  n. 
in  Lynn,  65 

in  Nantucket,  123,  125,  215 
in  Long  Island,  215-219 
in  Southern  Colonies,  265 
among  Anabaptists,  215 

to  be  peculiar  people,  xxiii,  146, 
167 

number  of  in  Pennsylvania,  xvi,  522 

first  to  preach  in  North  Carolina,  xvr 
265,  287 

number  of  in  America,  xv,  xvi 

and  Puritans,  xx-xxii 

views  on  marriage,   147,   249,   312, 

313.  547 

on  lotteries,  147,  148 
on  intoxicants,  148,  311,  530-531 
on  fidelity  to  obligations,  149 
on  oaths,  149,  169 
on  war,  150,  249,  260,  464,  468- 

470 
on  tithes,  153 


INDEX 


597 


Quakers  (contd. ) — 

views  on  political  institutions,  461-474 
on  revelation,  xxi,  xxii 

unity  amongst,  314-316 

membership  among,  546,  547,  551 
Quakers,  Christian,  370,  449,  454 

Confession  of  Faith,  449 

Queries,  449,  450 

join  other  churches,  454 

and  slavery,  511 
Quakers,  Free,  570 
Queries  and  advices — 

in  New  England,  145,  146 

prepared  by  George  Fox,  146  «. 

in  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting,  535- 

538,  579 
on  slavery  in  New  England,  163,  396 

in  New  York,  257 

in  Philadelphia,  323,  515 

in  Virginia,  323,  324  n. 
of  Christian  Quakers,  449 
Quinby,  Josiah,  250 

Randolph,  Edward,  192,  198,  199 
Ranters — 

George  Fox  and,  113 

how  different  from  Quakers,  136 

in  Long  Island,   229  n. ,  230,  231, 

234,  236,  241,  247,  248 
Rathbun,  Joshua,  dealing  with,  163  n. 
Rayner,  "priest,"  of  Dover,  persecutes 

Quaker  women,  104,  105 
Reckitt,  William,  505 
travels  in  Maine,  133 
in  Long  Island,  239 
Records — 

suggested  by  George  Fox,  141  n. ,  244 
first  in  Sandwich,  141  n. 
in  Rhode  Island,  141  n. 
in  New  York  and  in  America,  244 
in  Maryland,  304 
in  Virginia,  307 
in  North  Carolina,  307 
in  Pennsylvania,  439,  546 
Relief— 

of  Quaker  poor,    142,  143  n. ,  151, 

3°S.  3°8,  315,  456,  552,  553 
by  Quakers  in  war  time,  151,   152, 

259,  412.  553 
funds  for,  in  tobacco,  305 
Revell,  Randall,  335 
Rhode  Island — 

distinguished  from  Providence,  21  «. 
founded  by  "Antinomian"  party,  21, 

22,    171 

nursery  of  Quakerism,  21,  24,  25,  53 
early  government,  22,  23,  172,  181 
religious  difficulties,  23-25 
denominations  in,  193  n. ,  198 
applies  for  charter,  52,  174  n. ,  197 


Rhode  Island  (contd.  )— 

not  admitted  in  union  of  New  Eng 
land  Colonies,  54,  172 
refuses  to  remove  Quakers,  54-56 
prosperity  of,  191 
Quakers  in,  xv,  xvi,  72 
Quaker  Governors  of,  xv 

William  Coddington,  23,  172,  179, 

181,  191 

William  Coddington,  jun. ,  192 
Nicholas  Easton,  24  «.,  112,  174, 

177 
Walter  Clarke,  185  «.,  188,  189, 

192,  197 

Stephen  Hopkins,  164,  209 
Henry  Bull,  192,  195 
John  Easton,  195 
Caleb  Carr,  197 
John  Wanton,  203,  204 
Gideon  Wanton,  204 
Quakers  in  politics  of ,  xv,  1 7 1  -2 1 2 , 462 
laws  on  slavery,  158  n. ,  165  ». 
earliest  library  in,  208  n. 
in  war  time,  176-191,  196 
controversy  over  charter,  192-195 
controversy  over  militia,  196-197 
pirates  in,  199-200 
Richards,  William,  282  «. 
Richardson,  John,  of  Flushing,  250 
Richardson,  John — 
in  Nantucket,  124,  125 
in  two  American  visits,  391 
visits  Welsh  in  Pennsylvania,  443 
and  George  Keith,  455 
and  Indians,  498 
Richardson,  Thomas,  petition  against 

tithes,  155 

Richardson,  William,  255  «. 
Richmond,  William,  210 
Rider,  John,  254  ». 
Roberts,  John,  567 
Roberts,  Moses,  569 
Roberts,  Thomas,  237 
Robeson,  Andrew,  370 
Robinson,  Elizabeth,  411 
Robinson,  Isaac,  60 
Robinson,  Nicholas,  wife  of,  275 
Robinson,  William — 
goes  to  Boston,  47,  79 
banished,  79 

returns  to  Boston,  80,  81,  82 
dying  testimony,  35,  81 
death  sentence,  84 
execution  of,  84-86,  90  «. 
in  Piscataqua  region,  103  «. 
in  Virginia,  273 
in  Maryland,  278 
Rodman,  John,  144  «.,  246  n. 
Rodman,  Samuel,  disowned  for  buying 
slave,  163 


598      QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Rofe,  George,  41 

visits  Bermuda,  44 

begins  New  England  Yearly  Meet 
ings,  54  n. ,  144 

in  New  York  City,  226 

in  Virginia,  273,  303 

in  Maryland,  279,  303 
Rogers,  Richard,  254  «. 
Rose,  Philip,  79  «. 
Ross,  Alexander,  296 
Ross,  Betsey,  570 
Rous,  Lieut. -Col. ,  and  son  John,  first 

Quakers  in  West  Indies,  28,  41 
Rous,  John — 

challenges  Governor  Endicott,  53  n. 

in  Plymouth  Colony,  61,  62 

Quaker  missionary,  70 

in  Boston,  71,  72,  75,  76 

suffers  ear-cropping,  75 

in  England,  90 

in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica,  in,  112 
Rous,  Thomas,  226 
Rudyard,  Thomas,  368 
Ruse,  William,  443 
Russell,  Peleg,  151  «. 
Russell,  Richard,  refused  to  condemn 

W.  Christison,  96  n. 
Russell,  Richard,  Quaker   meeting   in 
house  of,  274 

Salem  (Massachusetts) — 

forerunners  of  Quakers  in,  25  «.,  64, 
65,  67,  216 

Quakers  in,  xvi,  72,  73 

Quakers  banished  from,  77 

business  meeting  in,  141,  144  ». 

relief  distributed  in,  152 
Salem  (New  Jersey),  366,  367 

Quaker  meetings  in,  372,  376  «.,  388 
Salmon,  Joseph,  41 
Salters,  Anna,  419  n. 
Sandiford,  Ralph,  516 
Sands,  David — 

travels  in  New  England,  133-134 

becomes  Quaker  minister,  254-255 
Sandwich — 

Seekers  in,  25  n. ,  57  n. ,  58,  215 

Nicholas  Upsall  in,  40,  57 

Quakers  in,  57-60,  72 

meeting  in,  137 

business  meetings  in,  141,  144  n. 

great  Quarterly  Meeting  in,  143 
Sauer,  Christopher,  442 
Scarborough,  Edmund,  335,  336 
Scarborough,  John,  518 
Scattergood,  Thomas,  411 
Scituate — 

Quaker  meeting  in,  61,  137,  201 

business  meeting  in,  141 

John  Burnyeat  in,  119 


Scotch- Irish — 

in  Carolinas,  298 

in  East  Jersey,  369 

in  Pennsylvania,  494,  505-508,  558 
Scott,  Catharine — 

first  Quaker  in  Providence,  25  «. ,  63, 

7S>  2°8 

whipping  of,  75 
Scott,  Joseph,  286,  339 

wife  of,  225  «. 
Scott,  Mary — 

marries  C.  Holder,  75 

comes  to  Boston,  80 
Scott,  Patience,  arrested  as  a  Quaker, 

79 

Scott,  Richard,  63,  79 

Scott,  Sarah,  marries  Stephen  Hopkins, 

208 

Scott,  Stephen,  292 
Scriptures — 

Quaker  views  on,  34  n. ,  457 

read  in  meetings,  456 
Seal,  Caleb,  572 
Seaman,  Thomas,  257 
Seaton,  Jane,  379 
Seekers,  xix,  24  «. 

in  Plymouth  Colony,  25  «.,  57  n. 

in  Salem,  65 
Seman,  John,  229  n. 
Severn  (Annapolis),  267,  276,  282  n. 
Sewel,  William,  545 
Shaftesbury,  Lord,  298 
Shapleigh,  Major,  104,  122 
Sharpe,  Peter,  279  ». 

in  politics,  330 

gifts  by,  331 
Sharpe,  William,  334 
Sharpies,  Isaac,  572 
Shattlewood,  William,  249 
Shattuck,  Samuel — 

befriends  Quakers,  67 

joins  Quakers,  69  n. 

banished  from  Salem,  77 

in  England,  90 

carries  King's  Missive,  94,  97-99 
Shattuck,  William,  169  n. 
Shearman,  Philip,  53  n. 
Shelter  Island,  77 

story  of,  226 

Quakers  in,  226,  230 
Shrewsbury,  379 

meetings  at,  360,  372,  376  n. 
"Sign,"  Quakers  appear  as  a,    108, 

109,  266  n. 

Simcock,  John,  443,  480 
Simons,  Thomas,  292 
Sisson,  John,  155 
Skein,  John,  Governor  of  West  Jersey, 

379 
Skipton  General  Meeting,  xiii  n. 


INDEX 


599 


Slavery — 

Quakers  and,  in  New  England,  156- 

166,  395,  396 
in  New  York,  255-258 
in    Southern    Colonies,    321-327, 

395 
in    Philadelphia    Yearly    Meeting 

396-397,  441,  510-521,  578 
petition  for  laws  against,  165,  258  «. , 

326,  511,  512 
laws  against  in  Rhode  Island,  158  «., 

165  n. 

in  Pennsylvania,  510,  520,  578 
Pastorius  and,  441,  511,  578 
Slocum,  Eleazer,  157  n. 
Slocum,  Peleg,  124,  153  ». 
Sluyter,  Peter,  361  «.,  419 
Small,  John,  69  n. 
Smith,  Hugh,  283,  285,  286 
Smith,  Isaac,  151  ». 
Smith,  John,  524,  529-530 
Smith,  Margaret — 
in  Boston,  So 
whipped,  109 
Smith,  Mary,  380 
Smith,  Mary  Murfin,  371  «. 
Smith,  Richard,  testimony  on  slavery, 

iS9 
Smith,  Richard — 

comes  to  Boston,  36,  39,  219 
first  American  Quaker,  219 
banished  from  Southampton,  Long 

Island,  219  n. 
Smith,  Samuel,  401,  403 
Smith,  Samuel,  546 
Smith,  William,  345 
Society  for  Propagation  of  the  Gospel, 

346  »..  350 
George  Keith  and,   370,   383,   454, 

455 

Somerton,  283,  286 
Soule,  James,  149 
Soule,  William,  157  n. 
Southeby,  William,  512 
Southwick,  Daniel,  69 
Southwick,  Josiah — 

banished  from  Salem,  77 

in  England,  90 

whipping  of,  102 
Southwick,  Lawrence  and  Cassandra — 

entertain  Quakers,  67 

persecution  of,  69 

banished,  77 

asceticism  of  Cassandra,  69  «. 

in  Shelter  Island,  226  «. 
Southwick,  Provided — 

to  be  sold,  69 

in  Boston,  80 

Spicer,  Samuel,  Long  Island  Quaker, 
245  «. ,  250 


Stacey,  Robert,  377 
Stacy,  Mahlon,  434 
Stan  ton,  Daniel,  518 
Starbuck,  Edward,  123 
Starbuck,  Mary,  124,  125 

meeting  established   in   her    house, 

126,  135 

Starbuck,  Nathaniel,  124 
Stephens,  William,  334 
Stephenson,  Marmaduke — 

"  Call"  of,  33 

banished  from  Boston,  79 

returns,  80 

in  Piscataqua  region,  103  n. 

dying  testimony,  82 

death  sentence,  84 

execution  of,  84-86,  90  «. 
Stevens,  Magdalen,  314 
Stockdale,  William,  383,  449 
Story,  Robert,  249 
Story,  Thomas — 

Quaker  missionary,  125 

establishes   meeting    in    Nantucket, 
126 

in  Long  Island,  236-238 

in  Southern  Colonies,  291-294, 344  «. 

at  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting,  389. 

on  William  Penn,  428  n.,  435 

and  Indians,  498 
Strange,  Lott,  181  n. 
Stubbs,  John — 

in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica,  111-112 

in  Rhode  Island,  112 

in  debate  with  Roger  Williams,  116 

letter  from,  266  ». 
Stuyvesant,  Governor,  and  the  Quakers, 

220-223,  22& 
Swain,  John,  123 
Swayne,  Thomas,  572 
Swedish  settlers,  358,  419,  422,  475 

and  Indians,  495 

Governors,  439 
Sykes,  John,  518 
Sylvester,  Constant,  226 
Sylvester,     Nathaniel,     owns     Shelter 

Island,  77,  226 
Synod  of  Ministers — 

first  in  America,  15 

to  consider  Antinomian  heresies,  15 

Taber,  Philip,  155 
Talbot,  Joseph,  jun.,  572 
Talbott,  Elizabeth,  314 
Taylor,  Christopher,  434 
Taylor,  Christopher,  528 
Taylor,  Edward,  233  «. 
Taylor,  John — 

testimony  on  Mary  Dyer,  86,  87  ». 

in  Long  Island,  225 

in  Shelter  Island,  226 


600      QUAKERS  IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Taylor,  Thomas — 

meeting  in  house  of,  330 

in  politics,  330,  331 
Teddes,  Edward,  79  «. 
Tedyuscung,  503,  504,  561 
Temple,  Governor,  offers  to  provide  for 

Quakers,  86 
Terrell,  Ann,  296 
Terry,  John,  150  n. 
Thomas,  Gabriel,  522,  527 
Thomas,  Governor  George,  490 
Thomas,  Sarah,  314 
Thomson,  Charles,  504,  505,  561,  562 
Thurston,   Edward,    in    Rhode   Island 

politics,  192 
Thurston,  Thomas — 

comes  to  Boston,  36-39 

returns  to  Boston,  46  n. 

journey      from     Virginia     to    New 
England,  73,  273 

in  Long  Island,  225 

in  Virginia,  267,  268,  269,  273 

in  Maryland,  276,  277,  278 

banished  from  Maryland,  278 

follower  of  J.  Perrot,  280  n. 
Tilton,  Mary,  225  n. 
Tilton,  John,  216 

migrates  to  Long  Island,  223 

imprisoned,  225  n. 

leader  of  Long  Island  Quakers,  245  «., 

250 
Tinicum,  361  n, ,  419 

school  on,  528 
Tithes — 

Quakers  refuse  to  pay,  153 

distraints  for,  153,  317,  318 

petitions  to  government  against,  154- 

156,  193  «• 
Tobacco — 

meeting  funds  in,  305,  314 

use  of,  discouraged,  310,  312 
Tolstoy,  469 
Tomkins,  Mary — 

in  Piscataqua,  103,  104,  130 

whipping  of,  104,  105,  276  «. 

in  Virginia,  276 
Toms,  Francis,  285,  307,  308,  344  n. 

in  provincial  council,  292 

meeting  in  house  of,  339 
Torrey,  Joseph,  181  n. 
Townsend,  Henry,  223 
Townsend,  Richard,  497 
Trask,  Henry  and  wife,  69  «. 
Trask,  Mary,  80 

Tredhaven,  119,  282,  290,  304,  322 
Tripp,  Benjamin,  149 
Tucker,  Abraham,  148,  151  «. 
Tucker,  Barzellai,  147  n. 
Tucker,  John,  153  «. 
Tucker,  Joseph,  148 


Tucker,  Moses,  150  n. 
Turner,  Robert,  454 
Turner,  Thomas,  498 

Underbill,  John,  250 

Underbill,  Captain  John,  in  Antinomian 

controversy,  8 
Underbill,  Samuel,  256 
Union  of  American  Colonies,  proposed 

by  William  Penn,  431 
Union  of  New  England  Colonies — 
Rhode  Island  refused  in,  54,  172 
endeavours  to  suppress  Quakers,  54- 

56,  76  n. 
Commissioners  of,  40,  54,  55,  57  n. , 

76  n. 

Upland  (see  Chester) 
Upsall,  Nicholas — 

befriends  Quakers,  28,  39 

banished,  40 

first  Quaker  convert  in  Massachusetts 

4i 
released  from  prison,  99 


Valentine,  Robert,  572 
Vane,  Sir  Henry,  8,  21,  172 
in  Antinomian  controversy,  n 
returned  to  England,  20 
Varney,  Peter,  150  «. 
Vassalborough,  135 
Virginia — 

Quaker  persecutions  in,   265,    269- 

273,  274,  276  «. ,  290,  317 
anti-Quaker    laws,     269-272,     319, 

320 
Quaker   visitors   in,    267,    268-269, 

280,  282,  287,  290-295 
John  Perrot  in,  275,  276,  280,  287, 

302  ». 
growth   of    Quakerism,    xvi,     271, 

295-297 

migrations  from  North  to,  295-296 
meetings   in,   274,    280,    283,    285, 

293,  295  «.,  296 

business  meetings  in,  303,  306,  307 
Bill  of  Rights,  318 
Established    Church    in,   265,   269- 

272,  317,  318  n. 
Quakers  and  militia  in,  318,  320 
slavery  in,  321,  323-326 
Quakers  in  politics  of,  xv,  334-338 

Wade,  Robert- 
comes  to  Pennsylvania,  420  «. ,  439 
meeting  in  house  of,  440 

Waite,  Jacob,  298 

Walden,  Richard,  105  «. 

Walker,  Dr. ,  293 


INDEX 


601 


Walker.  William,  383 
Wain,  Nicholas,  574 
Walton,  Sydrach,  150  «. 
Wanton,  Edward — 

meeting  in  house  of,  137 
becomes  Quaker,  201 
on  tithes,  154 
Wanton,  Gideon,  Governor  of  Rhode 

Island,  204 
Wanton,  John — 

Quaker  preacher,  203 

in  Rhode  Island  politics,  203 

Governor    of  Rhode    Island,    203, 

204 
Wanton,  Joseph,  154  ». 

shipbuilder    in      Tiverton,      Rhode 

Island,  20 1 
Wanton    William,    in    Rhode    Island 

politics,  202 
War- 
Quakers  and,  in  New  England,  23  «. , 

150,  175,  176,  188  n. 
in  New  York,  249 
in  New  Jersey,  392,  412 
in   Pennsylvania,  424,   425,   426, 
464,    468-470,  477,   478,    480, 
488-493,  507,  508, 518, 562-568 
Quaker   sufferings  in,    150,   279  «., 

319,  320  ».,  393,  412,  565-569 
Tolstoy  on,  469 
Indian,    21   «.,    121,    181-189,   4^9> 

492,  493-  505.  5°6 
Dutch,  174,  178 
French  and  Indian,   150,  196,  209, 

319.  393.  489.  554 
Revolutionary,  150,  320  «. ,  565-568 
Revolutionary  and  Quakerism,  xxvii 
in  New  York,  259-261 
in  Philadelphia    Yearly    Meeting, 
408,  411-413,   460,    461,  519, 
562-580 

Ward,  Samuel,  210 
Wardel,  Lydia — 

appears  as   "a   naked   sign,"   108, 

372 

in  New  Jersey,  372,  379 
Wardell,  Elizabeth,  372 
Warwick — 

Yearly  Meeting,  144  n. 
burned  in  Indian  War,  188 
Washington,  George,  152,  260,  570 
Waugh,  Dorothy — 
comes  to  Boston,  36-39 
returns  to  Boston,  46,  47,  73 
lands  first  in  New  York,  51,  220 
imprisoned,  220 
in  Barbadoes,  70  «. 
in  Salem,  73 

in  John  Norton's  Church,  108  «. 
Wayte,  Nicholas,  267 


Weeks,  Francis,  wife  of,  225  «. 
Welde,  Thomas,  5,  6,  8,  20 

writes  anti-Quaker  tracts,  30 
Welsh  settlers — 

in  Pennsylvania,  441,  442,  443,  523 

granted  a  "  Barony,"  442 
West,  Moses,  545 
Westbury,    Quaker    Meeting   in,   233, 

237,  246,  247 
Westchcster — 

Yearly  Meeting  at,  236 

Quakers  in,  xvi 
Westminster,  Treaty  of,  362 
West  River,  Maryland,  281,  303,  305 

sale  of  liquors  near,  311 
Wetherhead,  Mary — 

comes  to  Boston,  36-39 

returns  to  Boston,  46,  47 

lands  first  in  New  York,  51,  220 

imprisoned,  220 
Wharton,  T.  and  I.,  561 
Wharton,  Thomas,  567 
Wharton,  Edward,  69  «. 

imprisoned  in  Boston,  89  n. 

banished,  89  n. 

remains  in  Salem,  89  «. ,  96  n. 

goes  to  Dover,  etc.,  103,  104 
Wheat,  Benjamin,  385 
Wheelwright,  John,  5 

preaches  Covenant  of  Grace,  7,  10 

fast-day  sermon,  12-14 

life,  U-I2 

sentenced  to  exile,  14-15,  20 
Whipping — 

laws  for,  40,  66  «. 

first  woman  to  suffer,  57  n. 

last  woman  to  suffer,  no  n. 

instances  of,  61,  62,  66,  70,  75,  80, 
104,  106,  107,  108,  109,  130, 
222,  276  n. 

White,  Henry,  292,  307 
Whitehead,  George,  429 
Whitefield,  George,  128,  410 

in  Georgia,  300  n. 
Whittier,  J.  G.— 

poems  by,  69  n.  ,g8n.,  jogw.,  123  «., 
441 

anti-slavery  worker,  166 
Wickendam,  William,  218 
Widders,  Robert — 

in  Barbadoes  and  Jamaica,  in,  112 

in  Rhode  Island,  112 

in  Virginia,  282 

in  New  Jersey,  360 
Wieser,  Conrad,  402 
Wilcocks,  Henry,  331 
Wilkinson,  Ruth — 

mother  of  Stephen  Hopkins,  208 

library  in  house  of,  208  «. 
Willet,  Charity,  254  «. 


602      QUAKERS   IN  AMERICAN  COLONIES 


Williams,  Roger,  22 

founds  Providence,  21  «. 

first    in   New   World   to   announce 
soul-liberty,  21  n. ,  63 

in  Salem,  64,  65 

collision  with  George  Fox  and   the 
Quakers,  114-118 

Colonial  agent  to  England,  173  ». 
Willis,  William,  254  «. 
Wills,  Henry,  246  n. 
Wilson,  Alexander,  467 
Wilson,  Anne,  292 
Wilson,  Deborah,  108 

appears  as  "  naked  sign,"  109 
Wilson,  George,  in  Virginia,  272 
Wilson,  James,  568 
Wilson,  John — 

type  of  preacher,  7,  8 

excommunicates  Anne   Hutchinson, 
20 

at  hanging  of  Mary  Dyer,  86 
Wilson,  Samuel,  114  n. 
Windham,  Quakers  in,  133 
Wing,    Joseph,    travels    with    David 

Sands,  134  n. 
Winthrop,    John,    8,    16,    21   ».,    24, 

60  «. 
Winthrop,  John,  jun. ,  121 

Governor  of  Connecticut,  86 

pleads  for  Quakers,  86 
Winthrop,  Samuel,  60  «. 
Witches — 

searching  of  suspected,  28,  31 

trial  of,  275,  467 
Woodbridge,  358 
VVoodhouse,  ship — 

story  of,  45,  46 

voyage  of,  48-51,  219,  220 
Woodson,  Tarlton,  319 
Woolchurch,  Henry,  267,  268 
Woolman,  John,  176 

visits  New  England,  159,  160-163 

visits  New  York,  255 

and  slavery,  159-163,  322-324,  396, 
397-  5iS.  Si6,  518,  519 

and  Indians,  396,  404-407 

and  war,  393,  394 

ministry  of,  409,  410 

life  of,  394,  395,  400 

in  England,  399 

Journal  and  Essays   of,    394,    395, 
397-399-  4°o 

and  Quaker  ideals,  571 

type  of  Quaker  saint,  xxix  n. 
Women — 

first  to  preach  Quaker  message  in 
London,  26 

first  to  preach  in  universities,  26-27 

first  to  preach  Quaker  message  in 
America,  4,  26,  265 


Works,  Covenant  of,  9,  17,  18 

preachers  of,  8 
Wright,  Anthonie,  245  n. 
Wyatt,  William,  339 

Yarnal,  Nathan,  jun. ,  572 

Yarmouth,  North  (Harpswell),  Quaker 
ism  in,  132 

Yearly  Meeting,  Baltimore — 

organised  by  John   Burnyeat,    281, 

288,  293,  303,  304 
business  of,  308,  311 
and  slavery,  324,  325 
sends  representatives  to  Philadelphia 

Yearly  Meeting,  437 
territory  covered  by,  438 

Yearly  Meeting,  London — 
epistle  from  New  York  to,  252 
first  American  epistle  to,  373 
influence  on  American  Meetings,  438 
earliest  discipline  in,  229  «.,  438 
disowns  George  Keith,  383,  453 
in  Pennsylvania  politics,  491,  492 
correspondence  with  other  meetings, 

Si3 

Yearly  Meeting,  New  England — 
beginning  ot,  54,  144 
visitors  to,  HE,  127,  160 
Colonies  represented  in,  113  «.,  144 
number  of  attenders  of,  127,  129  «., 

144 

held  at  different  places,  144 
representatives  to,  appointed,  145 
business  of,  143  «.,  145 
and  slavery,  157-166,  396 
sets  off  Long   Island   as   a  Yearly 

Meeting,  144  n. ,  246 
sends  representatives  to  Philadelphia, 

437 

Yearly  Meeting,  New  York,  239 
set  off  from  New  England,  144  n. , 

246 
General    Meeting    in    Westchester, 

236,  247 

views  on  slavery,  257-258 
Yearly   Meeting    for    North    America 

proposed,  376,  434,  437 
Yearly  Meeting  of  North  Carolina,  307 

and  slavery,  324  n. ,  325,  326 
Yearly  Meeting,  Philadelphia — 

set    up    at    Burlington,    376,    377, 

437 
held  alternate  years  in  Philadelphia, 

39L  437 
moved  permanently  to  Philadelphia, 

391,  408,  437 
and  yellow   fever    in    Philadelphia, 

389 
size  of,   377,    387,    393.    522,    523, 

524.  565 


INDEX 


603 


Yearly  Meeting,  Philadelphia  (contd. ) — 
territory  embraced  by,  438 
type  of  membership,  441,  530-534 
ministry  in,  525,  530 
general    organisation    of,    534-539, 

550-555 

William  Penn  and,  423,  433-436 
proposes  Yearly  Meeting  for  North 

America,  376,  434,  437 
disowns  George  Keith,  370,  452 
and    slavery,    396,    397,    510-521, 

572.  573.  578 
and  Indians,  499,  500 


Yearly  Meeting,  Philadelphia  (contd. ) — 
and  education,  528-529,  571,  574- 

576 
and  liquor  problem,  530,  531,  572, 

576-578 

and  Pennsylvania  politics,  510 
in  the  Revolution,  562-571 
reformation  of,  571-580 
Yearly    Meeting    of    Virginia,     306, 

311  «.,  316 
and  slavery,  323,  324  «.,  325 

Zane,  Isaac,  574 


THE   END 


Printed  by  R.  &  R.  CLARK,  LIMITED,  Edinburgh, 


IN  PREPARATION. 
COMPANION  VOLUME  TO  THE  PRESENT  WORK. 

THE    BEGINNINGS 

OF 

QUAKERISM 


BY 


WILLIAM  CHARLES  BRAITHWAITE 


LONDON  :  MACMILLAN  AND  CO.,  LTD. 


BY  PROFESSOR  RUFUS  M.  JONES 

STUDIES   IN 
MYSTICAL   RELIGION 

8vo.      I2s.  net. 

CONTENTS 

Introduction.  The  Nature  and  Value  of  First-hand  Experience 
in  Religion. — Chap.  I.  The  Mystical  Element  in  Primitive 
Christianity — II.  Ministry  and  Organization  in  the  Early  Church 
— III.  Montanism :  A  Return  to  Prophecy — IV.  Roots  of 
Mysticism  in  Classical  Literature — V.  Mysticism  in  the  Church 
Fathers — VI.  Dionysius,  "  the  Areopagite  " — VII.  A  Great 
Light  in  the  Dark  Ages :  John  the  Scot,  called  Erigena — VIII. 
The  Waldenses,  an  Anti- Sacerdotal  Sect — IX.  St.  Francis  and 
the  "Spiritual  Franciscans" — X.  A  Group  of  Pantheistical 
Mystics — XL  Brotherhood  Groups  in  the  Thirteenth  Century — 
XII.  Meister  Eckhart— XIII.  The  Friends  of  God— XIV.  The 
Brethren  of  the  Common  Life — XV.  The  Pre- Reformation  in 
England :  Wyclif  and  The  Lollards — XVI.  The  Anabaptists — 
XVII.  Anabaptism  in  England — XVIII.  The  Family  of  Love — 
XIX.  The  Seekers  and  the  Ranters — XX.  Individual  Mystics  in 
the  Period  of  the  English  Commonwealth — Appendix — Index. 

SOME  PRESS  OPINIONS 

GUARDIAN. — "Those  who  desire  a  good  account  of  religious  thought  in 
its  less  known  but  immensely  powerful  workings  beneath  the  surface  of  sixteenth 
and  seventeenth-century  life  will  find  this  book  a  useful  and  extremely  interest 
ing  guide." 

SPECTATOR.— "Mr.  Rufus  Jones's  'Studies'  are  full  of  charm  and 
interest." 

DAIL  Y  CHRONICLE. — "  This  is  a  most  interesting  and  suggestive  book, 
dealing  in  clear  and  straightforward  language  with  a  difficult  and  complicated 
subject.  ...  A  singularly  stimulating  book." 

DAIL  Y  NEWS. — "  A  most  interesting  study  of  those  mystics  in  Christian 
history  who  were  either  opposed  to  or  apart  from  the  main  bulk  of  working 
Christianity.  .  .  .  This  very  valuable  book  is  in  substance  something  very  like 
a  rebuke  of  the  mediaeval  Church,  not  for  being  too  mystical  but  for  not  being 
mystical  enough.  .  .  .  The  book  contains  abundant  material  of  the  best  histori 
cal  and  literary  sort." 

LONDON  :  MACMILLAN  AND  CO.,  LTD. 


THE  TRIAL  OF  OUR  FAITH 

AND  OTHER   PAPERS 
BY  THOMAS  HODGKIN,  D.C.L. 

8vo.     73.  6d.  net. 

EXTRACT  FROM  THE  PREFACE 

"  THIS  little  volume  consists  mainly  of  lectures  delivered  during  the 
last  forty  years  to  my  fellow-members  of  the  Society  of  Friends. 
I  have  been  frequently  asked  to  publish  them,  and  now  that  my 
lecturing  days  are  of  necessity  drawing  to  a  close,  I  decide  to 
comply  with  that  request. 

"  I  have  also  included  a  few  articles  contributed  to  a  literary 
periodical  of  the  same  Society,  the  Friends'  Quarterly  Examiner. 

"  It  will  be  seen  at  once  that  there  is  no  pretence  of  unity  of 
subject  in  these  papers,  which  deal  with  the  biographies  of  men 
so  different  in  social  position  as  a  Syrian  king  and  a  Leicester 
shire  shepherd,  but  in  the  process  of  revision  I  have  found  more 
than  I  expected  of  a  certain  unity  of  idea  pervading  them.  Most 
of  them  deal  with  the  question  how  Faith  may  be  won,  and  how 
it  has  been  fought  for  in  old  times  by  men  who  felt  the  heavy 
hand  of  the  persecutor.  There  is  almost  inevitably  a  good  deal 
of  repetition  in  the  book,  the  same  thought  and  sometimes  the 
same  illustration  recurring  in  different  lectures,  but  I  have  not 
thought  it  necessary  to  attempt  to  correct  this  blemish." 

CONTENTS 

THE  TRIAL  OF  OUR  FAITH. 

THE  CENTRAL  MYSTERY  OF  CHRISTIANITY. 

PREDESTINATION. 

THE  EPISTLE  TO  THE  GALATIANS. 

EARLY  CHRISTIAN  WORSHIP. 

THE  FEASTS  AND  FASTS  OF  ISRAEL. 

THE  EPISTLES  OF  IGNATIUS. 

PAGANISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY. 

ON  THE  PROSPECTS  OF  ENGLISH  PROTESTANTISM. 

GEORGE  Fox. 

JAMES  PARNEL. 

ANTIOCHUS  EPIPHANES  AND  THE  MACCABEES. 


CONTEMPORARY  REVIEW.— "Dr.  Hodgkin  places  many  households, 
and  many  thinkers  on  the  mysteries  of  human  life  and  faith,  in  his  debt  by  the 
collection  and  publication  of  these  lectures.  His  great  historical  and  analytical 
powers  add  a  peculiar  value  to  his  discussion  of  our  modern  religious  problems." 

LONDON:  MACMILLAN  AND  CO.,  LTD. 


LOLLARDY  AND  THE 
REFORMATION  IN   ENGLAND 

AN   HISTORICAL  SURVEY 

BY  JAMES  GAIRDNER,  C.B.,  LL.D.,  D.Litt. 

8vo.     Vols.  I.  and  II.,  2 is.  net.     Vol.  III.,  IDS.  6d.  net. 

SOME  PRESS  OPINIONS  OF  VOLS.  I.  AND  II. 

SPECTA  TOR. — "A  book  which  is  invaluable  to  students,  and  of  perman 
ent  importance  as  a  work  of  reference." 

GUARDIAN. — "Whether  we  are  in  entire  accord  with  him  or  not,  we 
recognise  that  his  volumes  must  of  necessity  take  a  high  place  among  authori 
tative  works  of  the  period  with  which  they  deal." 

EVENING  S7^ANDAKD.—"1\iz  book  is  indispensable,  for  on  this 
period  of  our  history  the  authority  of  Dr.  Gairdner  is  supreme.  The  vast  stores 
of  information,  the  unimpeachable  accuracy  of  the  author,  the  elaborate  labour 
devoted  to  the  minutest  detail,  all  help  to  render  the  work  invaluable." 

A  THEN&  UM. — "  The  special  value  that  these  pages  possess  arises  from 
the  unrivalled  first-hand  knowledge  that  the  writer  has  of  the  questions  involved, 
also  from  the  proof  they  afford  that  he  has  triumphantly  resisted  the  temptation 
to  omit  or  slur  over  matters  that  do  not  tally  with  particular  prejudices,  or  to 
introduce  fanciful  colouring  for  picturesque  effect.  .  .  .  Every  student  of  the 
reign  of  Henry  VIII.  will  feel  grateful  to  him  for  the  production  of  a  work  of 
the  highest  standard,  wherein  is  marshalled,  with  innate  honesty  of  purpose, 
an  abundance  of  facts  concerning  a  most  complex  and  perplexing  period  of 
English  history  in  Church  and  State." 


SELECTED  AND  TRANSLATED  BY 

MARGARET  A.  CURRIE 

Svo.      I2s.  net. 

TIMES. — "There  can  be  no  question  that  they  afford  at  once  the  most 
complete  revelation  of  the  Reformer  s  character  and  spirit,  and  throw  invaluable 
light  on  the  course  of  the  Reformation.  ...  It  is  a  great  thing  to  get  a  volume 
of  less  than  500  pages  which  gives  a  fair  specimen  in  500  letters  of  the  wisdom, 
the  humour,  the  humanity,  the  religion,  and  the  theology  of  Luther's  life." 

OUTLOOK. — "  These  letters  present  a  remarkable  study  of  the  mind  which 
by  native  sincerity  and  hardihood  did  so  much  to  revolutionise  half  Europe. " 

NA  TION. — "  A  hundred  years  ago  Coleridge  declared, '  I  can  scarcely  con 
ceive  a  more  delightful  volume  than  might  be  made  from  Luther's  letters,  if 
translated  in  the  simple,  idiomatic,  hearty  mother  tongue  of  the  original.'  No 
such  volume  exists  to-day  ;  but  here,  in  The  Letters  of  Martin  Luther,  selected 
and  translated  by  Margaret  Currie,  is  a  'delightful  volume'  in  idiomatic  English. 
It  reveals  the  very  heart  of  one  of  the  greatest  of  the  children  of  mankind  : 
impetuous,  tender,  compassionate,  full  of  vigour  and  full  of  laughter :  with, 
beneath  all  surface  scorn  and  playfulness,  a  profound  seriousness  of  outlook  and 
purpose  :  a  man  'open  to  the  divine  significance  of  life.'" 

LONDON:  MACMILLAN  AND  CO.,  LTD.